Shamita Shetty – The first woman pilot on the Indian silver screen
15th Feb 2004
23.13 IST
By ApunKaChoice Bureau
The voluptuous Shamita Shetty , who after her debut film Mohabbatein sizzled only in item numbers in Mere Yaar Ki Shaadi Hai and Saathiya , is all set to become the first female pilot on the Indian silver screen in her latest film Agni Pankh.
Agni Pankh pays a tribute to the ''heroics of those who touch the skies to protect their land''.
''The film is dedicated to the life of our brave Air Force pilots and captures on the big screen the various trials and tribulations in their day-to-day life,'' says director of the film Sanjiv Puri.
Addressing a press meet recently in New Delhi to promote the film, Puri said, ''the film chronicles the life of people in the Indian Air Force; how they cope with pressures of day-to-day life and also how their personal lives affect their professional life.''
Agni Pankh is the story of three fighter pilots - Siddharth (played by Jimmy Shergill ), Sameer (played by model-turned actor Sameer Dharmadhikari) and Vishal (played by Rahul Dev ) and the women in their lives (played by Richa Pallod, Shamita and Divya Dutta respectively).
Set in the breathtaking locales of the Kashmir Valley, the film chronicles the personal lives of the pilots in the thrilling backdrop of Air Force fighters taking off for sortie after sortie.
The film shows the fighter pilots battling the disruptive forces of Pakistan in the Kashmir valley, including a fast-paced climax of the pilots' dare devil escape from the Pakistani Prisoners of War (POW) camp with the Pakistani rangers and trackers chasing them.
On being asked whether the film resorted to Pak-bashing like many earlier films, Puri clarified that the war was not the base of his film's story but just a part of it.
''Our film is not about Pak-bashing. The main thread of the story is the life of IAF fighter pilots and fighting Pakistani forces is just one of the situations they are faced with while fulfilling their professional obligations,'' Puri said.
Puri pointed out that Agni Pankh was only the third film in the history of Hindi cinema to reflect the life of Air force personnel.
''The last film that took a realistic look at the life of Air Force pilots was Shashi Kapoor 's Vijeta, a film that was made more than two decades ago,'' he said.
Agni Pankh is slated to release across the country on February 27.
The voluptuous 