Ponty Chadha’s last appointment with Bollywood

The death of liquor baron and film distributor Ponty Chadha is a major blow to Bollywood. At least 6-7 prominent filmmakers were in serious negotiations with Chadha over big-budget projects which would now have to seek a different outlet for financial sustenance now. Apparently Bollywood financier Bharat Shah was the last person from the Hindi film industry to have negotiated with Ponty Chadha. Bharat Shah has major financial stakes in director Anand Kumar’s Sanjay Dutt-Arshad Warsi-Vivek Oberoi production Zilla Ghazibad. Shah was to fly to Delhi Saturday, the day tragedy struck Ponty Chadha’s life to screen the film for Chadha who showed a keen interest in the distribution of the film. Barely an hour before Ponty was to view Zilla Ghaziabad he was shot dead. Confirming this, the Zilla Ghaziabad producer Vinod Bachchan said: ‘Bharat bhai is closely involved with my film. He was in serious negotiation with Ponty Chadhaji for the worldwide distribution of our film. ‘On Friday evening at around 7 pm Bharat bhai spoke to Ponty Chadhaji about screening our film for his viewing. On Saturday morning our representatives flew into Delhi with the film. Our appointment was at 4 p.m. Our representatives were waiting at his office for Pontyji when the shocking news came at 3.30 pm’