The actor miffed with Prakash Jha for positioning Raajneeti as a romance and not as a political drama

Ajay Devgn is upset with his close friend, filmmaker Prakash Jha, for sidelining him in the promotions and publicity of Jha's Raajneeti. The actor has been missing in most of the promotional campaigns for the film, with the focus being on Ranbir Kapoor and Katrina Kaif.

Says a source close to Ajay, "Raajneeti is a powerful political dramatic thriller where the entire cast has good roles. But the actor feels the director has been only showing the romantic angle between Ranbir and Katrina to exploit the couple's chemistry and off-screen dosti."

The source adds that Devgn didn't react at first but when it became apparent that Jha was only interested in promoting the Ranbir-Kat pair he sent a strong message through one of the director's associates.

"Ajay told Prakash in no uncertain terms that he felt that Rajneeti was being promoted as a romantic film when it was essentially a political drama. The actor didn't want the audience to feel cheated into thinking it was a romantic film."

AJ's first time
Adds the actor's friend, "Ajay feels he has been taken for granted long enough. Because of their decade-long friendship, so he felt he could speak his mind with Prakash. It's barely 10 days to the release and not much of the publicity has featured Ajay.

He has never spoken strongly to anyone before and Prakash got naturally jittery. He told Ajay that he had nothing to worry about. He even flew down to Goa for a couple of days to complete some shots with the actor and sort out the issue."

A shocked Prakash Jha reacts, "I would like to check with Ajay before saying anything. Why should he be unhappy with the promos? The music people are doing the promos and they wanted to show the romantic angle. Since the romance is only between Ranbir and Katrina, the promos are showing that.

But now the dialogue promos have started which has Ajay mouthing a very powerful dialogue. I love Ajay as much as I love myself and can never sideline him. I don't think there's any issue. I am doing my next two films with him."

Ajay Devgn remained unavailable for comment.

DEVGN IN RAAJNEETI
In Raajneeti, Ajay plays Suraj Kumar, a morally strong, pricipled and upright leader of the Dalits yet represents the wrong people (Manoj Bajpai and Ranbir Kapoor) as they had helped him when he was humiliated by Nana Patekar and his political party because of his low caste. Ajay represents Karna's character in Mahabharata.