Dia Mirza: It was my dream to work with Vijay Varma

Mumbai, Aug 19 (IANS) Actress Dia Mirza, who is awaiting the release of her upcoming series ‘IC814’, has heaped praise on her co-actor Vijay Varma.

The trailer of the series was unveiled on Monday, and it follows the story of the hijack of the Indian Airlines Flight 814 by the Pakistani militants of the terrorist outfit Harkat-ul-Mujahideen.

At the Malhar Film Festival, Dia Mirza spoke about Vijay's immersive approach to his role. She expressed her admiration for his complete dedication to the character, revealing that she never caught a glimpse of him outside of his character during the entire shoot.Talking about the same, she said, "This guy has stayed in one space for his entire shoot. It was my dream to work with Vijay. On paper, we are part of the same story, but I never saw him at work. I have to find a way to make sure I get to work with him because I'm such a huge fan”.

‘IC814’ is directed by Anubhav Sinha of ‘Thappad’, ‘Mulk’ and ‘Article 15’ fame. It is based on the hijack of the Indian Airlines Flight 814 shortly after it entered Indian airspace. The hijackers ordered the aircraft to be flown to a series of locations including Amritsar, Lahore, and across the Persian Gulf and Dubai.They finally forced the aircraft to land in Kandahar, Afghanistan, which at the time was controlled by the Taliban. The hijackers released 27 of 176 passengers in Dubai but fatally stabbed one and wounded several others.The motive for the hijacking was to secure the release of Islamist terrorists held in prison in India including Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh and Masood Azhar, and a Pakistani-backed Kashmiri militant, Mushtaq Ahmed Zargar. The three have since been implicated in other terrorist actions, such as the 2001 Indian Parliament attack, the 2002 kidnapping and murder of Daniel Pearl, the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks, the 2016 Pathankot attack and the 2019 Pulwama attack‘IC814’ is set to land on August 29 on Netflix.