It’s the first time ever that India’s India Post department has joined hands with films. But Road To Sangam has been managing to achieve never done before milestones in its wake.

India Post department has tied up with forthcoming film Road To Sangam to promote the latter. “It’s a moment of great pride for us. Producer Amit Chheda and we were in talks with them since a long time but finally they have offered us the impossible. This is the first time in the history of Hindi Cinema that India Post has associated with any film in such a manner. They are giving us full marketing support with Ads in leading papers. They have also promised ads in all leading general Entertainment channels. They are also giving the film the honour of a special cover of Road To Sangam. They have even offered to put posters in all the post offices too,” comments director Amit Rai.

Adds the producer, Amit Chheda, “It’s the magic of Mahatma Gandhi and the way we have imbibed his principles in contemporary current scenario. Also India Post liked the way we have used a postcard in the script and in all our marketing activity. I am happy that I accepted the script of Amit Rai although subject was very sensitive and tricky to handle while filming.”

As per the release from India Post, department of posts has been serving the people of India, the Aam Aadmi, for more than 150 years. The ubiquitous post card of the department has always been the cheapest and probably the most loved tool of communication of the ordinary Indian who shares an emotional bond with the Department of Posts through Post Card.

Mahatma Gandhi found in Post Card the most economical way of communicating with people that was in sync with his frugal life style which identified with the Aam Aadmi of India.

The film Road to Sangam is inspired by the event of discovery of Mahatma Gandhi’s ashes in a bank locker some years ago. The protagonist of the film, Husmatullah, a mechanic living in Allahabad, portrayed by Paresh Rawal, uses Post Card to reach out to all the members of his community in his city asking them to join the last journey of Gandhi’s ashes to Sangam.

Directed by Amit Rai and starring the stalwarts like Om Puri, Paresh Rawal, Pavan Malhotra, Swati Chitnis and other NSD actors, Road To Sangam is a mix of reality with fiction to bring in the surreal influence of history with contemporary. An urn of Mahatma Gandhi’s Ashes is discovered in vault of a National Bank as late as in 2000. Bapu’s grandson Tushar Gandhi decides to immerse the ashes in Sangam at Allahabad. He wants to carry the procession on the same truck that had carried Bapu’s ashes in 1948. A God fearing, devout and renowned Muslim mechanic named Hashmat Ullah (Paresh Rawal), is entrusted the job of repairing an old V8 Ford Engine, unaware that it was once used to carry ashes of Mahatma Gandhi to immerse in the “Sangam’ of holy rivers Ganga, Yamuna and invisible Saraswati. Its historic significance becomes Hashmat Ullah’s bane and salvage.

Road To Sangam has so far many awards at various film festivals like MAMI, Hamburg, South Africa, Los Angles etc and standing ovation at CANNES.

- Sampurn Media