Ma Anand Sheela hasn’t given Priyanka Chopra permission for biopic, says Alia Bhatt has the necessary spunk to play her

Ma Anand Sheela or Sheela Biernstiel is one of the most popular millennial icons of our times. In the series Wild, Wild Country, she comes across as a redoubtable stateswoman who kicked up a storm in the media with her witty and provocative one- liners. But when you meet her, her warmth, calmness and soft words melt you. In the ’80s, she had the media chasing her. Cut to today, you have filmmakers wanting to make films on her. But what does she want? Here’s what the 70-year-old has to say:

We heard you want Alia Bhatt to portray you on screen. Have you seen any of her films?

I saw bits of a film that my sister was watching, and I thought, I looked like her when I was young. I asked my sister, ‘Did I look like her when I was young? Do you remember’? And she said, ‘Yes, you do’. I feel she has the spunk in her that I had. Spunk is very necessary and it is very natural, it is not artificial, not cosmetic, it is genuine.

After Priyanka Chopra Jonas announced that she’d star in a biopic on you, you sent her a legal notice. Is that true?

I told her I do not give her permission to do [the] film because I have not chosen her... In Switzerland, we send legal notices very simply. I sent her an email which is accepted there as legal.

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Have you heard back from Priyanka or team on that?

No, never. Not even a courtesy letter that they received my notice but that’s not an issue, maybe she never had the opportunity to meet me or make time to meet me and it is no big issue... not everybody has the time to meet me.

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