Director: Kalpana Lajmi
Producer: Vikas Sahni
Cast: Sushmita Sen, Mithun Chakraborty, Anuj Sawhney
Music: Aadesh Shrivastava

Kalpana Lajmi’s sensational project Chingaari has Bollywood diva Sushmita Sen execute the role of a sex-worker. Chingaari is adapted from a book ‘The Postman and the Prostitute‘, authored by Bhupen Hazarika fifteen years ago. It’s a love story set on the Bhutan-Assam border.

Chingari is based on three characters - a young postman, a sex-worker and a village priest who cause hindrance in their love. The young postman, Chandan Mishra is played by Anuj Sawhney who comes as a crusader with innocent views. Sushmita plays the character of Basanti, who is a humiliated, frightened and ravaged sex worker. The turning point in her life comes when she experiences love and respect from Chandan. But she is not allowed to even dream of a relationship with him. Mithun Chakraborthy plays Bhuvan Panda, a village priest who misuses his powers and secretly lust for Basanti. Basanti revolts and that create chingaari - a spark of revolution.

The climax of the film sees an exploited Basanti rising from her ashes to assume a rebellious godly figure when she decides to crush all the vices rampant in a remote village. Armed with a trident, she embodies the fury of the god themselves at the exploitative acts masterminded by popular god men.

Sushmita was not the first choice for this role. Director Kalpana Lajmi had first offered the role to Bipasha Basu, who turned it down almost immediately. She then approached Raveena Tandon. Raveena was keen to be a part of the movie but the actress got married and became a busy mother. After that Kalpana asked Priety Zinta. Preity declined the offer saying that she had already played a prostitute in a film. This role was meant to be Sushmita Sen’s. Sushmita reduced her market price by 50 per cent for Chingaari.

Actor Karan Nath was to play the postman in the film. But due to the project being delayed, and with him having got an offer to act with Amitabh Bachchan in another film, he and Kalpana parted ways amicably. The postman’s role was also offered to Akshay Kumar, Akshaye Khanna and Tusshar Kapoor. But nobody was willing to don the soft, romantic character. So Kalpana settled for a lesser-known actor, Anuj.

Chingaari is made in a modest budget of Rs. 4 crores.