Ashutosh Gowariker’s Panipat landed itself in another controversy when royals from Rajasthan objected against showing their ancestor Maharaja Surajmal of Bharatpur as not helping the Maratha army while they were retreating after the battle. Indian Forest Service officer Parveen Kaswan fact-checked the film and in a series of tweets revealed that the depiction of Maharaja Surajmal in Panipat is wrong and ill-informed.

Panipat stars Arjun Kapoor, Kriti Sanon and Sanjay Dutt in the lead roles.

On Sunday, IFS officer Parveen Kaswan tweeted, “Not only wrong but also ill-informed depiction of Maharaja SurajMal in #Panipat movie. His few advices to Marathas: 1) Don’t bring women & children with army. Will be costly & dangerous. 2) Attack in summer, more success 3) Dont fight straight with big army, go for raids first. 4) Don’t loot forts at Delhi. It will unite muslim rulers with Abdali 5) Fact is Agra was already with Surajmal even before battle. Issue was of Delhi fort which if given to Surajmal he would supply food to army. 6) Fact is Surajmal used to speak in Brij bhasha not Haryanavi.”

Parveen Kaswan further wrote,”The Maratha army had 50,000 soldiers & around 1,00,000 non combatants including women & children. Now who will go in a war like this. This was strongly objected by Surajmal since it would be costly & dangerous. For Which Bhau didn’t pay any attention.”

In an official statement, Vishvendra Singh said, “It is very sad that a great man like Maharaja Surajmal Jat of Bharatpur has been depicted in the film Panipat in a very wrong way while tampering with historical facts. I believe that the film should be banned in view of the huge opposition in the Jat community of Haryana, Rajasthan and north India, otherwise, the law and order of the country may deteriorate.”

Former Chief Minister of Rajasthan Vasundhara Raje also criticized the film. “The incorrect portrayal of the noble, self-respecting, highly revered Maharaja Surajmal is condemnable,” she tweeted in Hindi.

Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, however, asserted that it is the prerogative of the government to probe if facts are incorrectly portrayed in Panipat. During an interaction with mediapersons, he said, “I have not seen the movies. It is a prerogative of the government. If any such incident is there in the movie, the concerned departments must be looking into it. It will be shown.”

In another controversy, Marathi novelist Vishwas Patil accused the makers of Panipat of stealing the film’s plot from his 1988 novel of the same name.

Earlier, soon after the trailer of the film was released, Nawabzada Shadab Ali Bahadur, the eighth generation descendent of Peshwa Bajirao, had served the makers of Panipat a notice, against a particular dialogue in the trailer. The dialogue in question is: “Maine suna hai Peshwa jab akele muhim par jaate hain to ek Mastani ke saath laut te hain (I’ve heard that whenever the Peshwa goes to the war alone, he returns with a Mastani).” This is mouthed by Parvati Bai, essayed by Kriti Sanon, who is Sadashiv Rao Bhau’s wife.

While earlier, Ashutosh Gowariker asked people to watch the film and then decide if it shows anyone in bad light, he has not spoken anything after the royals from Rajasthan spoke against the film. It is yet to be seen what the director wants to say in his defence.