By Manissha Despaande, Bollywood Trade News Network

Contrary to belief, Rajkumar Santoshi’s project on Prithviraj Chauhan hasn’t been called off nor has Santoshi backed out of the film due to Sunny Deol. On the contrary, he is currently working on the budget of the film after he recently finalized its screenplay. Santoshi recently confessed this in an interview to a section of the press, saying that he had every intention of going ahead with the film. He also admitted that he had resolved his differences with Sunny Deol and was even contemplating making a film with the latter. It may be recalled that a month ago there was news that Ajay Devgan and Santoshi had decided to call off the Prithviraj-Samyukta project since they did not want two films to be made on the same subject. It is however not clear what is Devgan’s stand on the project since he and his business manager, Kumar Mangat, have been keeping a discreet silence on the project.
However there is an interesting twist to the project now that Santoshi has decided not to cast Aishwarya Rai in it.  The reason cited by him is that Ash does not fit into the mould of the 16-year old bride in a swayamwar in the film, which forms one of the important scenes in the film.  He is now planning to cast a completely new girl in the film. Interestingly, Santoshi is also unlikely to work with the former Miss-World in his other film, SAAMNA, for which she had been earlier confirmed, the reason being her date problems. Is Aishwarya Rai losing out on the opportunity of working with the much sought after director or is it the other way round?