This is the latest update on Dhanush! A few days back, biggie Aascar Ravichandran revealed to this newspaper that he had signed Dhanush for a film and was working on the details.

Now it is learnt that the National Award winner, who has been frequenting Mumbai post Kolaveri Di, had met Bharatbala of Vande Maataram fame and listened to a script. Fascinated by the content, the Aadukalam star evinced a keen interest to work in it and shared it with Aascar Ravi. A few years ago, Bharathbala was planning to do a multilingual feature film with Kamal Haasan and A.R.R. titled The 19th Step.

The film was to be an Indo-Japanese production, scripted and written by ace Malayalam writers M.T. Vasudevan Nair and Jayamohan, and about how the ancient martial art form of Kerala was taken to Japan.

However, the project failed to take off due to various reasons. Now, close sources inform that Bharatbala is reviving the project and has zeroed down on Dhanush to play the male protagonist, with Rahman composing the music. One may recall that A.R.R., in an earlier chat with DC had said that he had four projects in Tamil including one with Bharatbala. A source close to Rahman has confirmed that he has signed a film with Aascar! In all probability, Asin may be roped in for the project, to sizzle alongside Dhanush.

Few months ago, there was a buzz that Bharatbala wanted to make The 19th Step with Bollywood star Ajay Devgn and was looking out for a suitable actor for the Tamil version — he felt Dhanush fitted the bill for the Tamil version.

But a source from Aascar Films ruled out any such possibility. Dhanush is a national star now, and will be soon venturing into straight Hindi films. With international composer ARR signed up for the music, the production house is likely to consider a dual version — Tamil and Hindi — with Dhanush. Also, they might prefer to dub in other languages. So, Ajay Devgn might not be a part of the project after all!