In January 1989, we saw the release of the Anil Kapoor- Jackie Shroff starrer film Ram Lakhan. Directed by Subhash Ghai, the film has since gone on to become a cult classic which even today has its share of fans. Well, offering some old school nostalgic charm to fans, we hear that Ghai’s Mukta Arts has now ventured into the merchandising space.

Confirming and detailing Mukta Arts’ plan for merchandising, Chaitanya Chinchlikar, Business Head, Whistling Woods, tells us, “Yes we have ventured into merchandising space and have signed a deal with Desi Pop World in December to develop the merchandise range that will be available for purchase.” Elaborating the merchandising plan further, Chinchlikar adds, “Basically we will feature both physical merchandise and exploit the IP digitally. The digitized version will recreate key characters that will be seen doing online content like depicting what characters are doing 20 years after a film’s release and so on... The other physical merchandise part will feature action figures, decals, mugs, t-shirts, mobile accessories, et al that will be available to the general public shortly.”

Quiz Chinchlikar about the cost range for the planned action figures and he adds, “Desi Pop World will be developing and executing the sales aspect, however, there will have two price brackets, one being the affordable range which would include t-shirts, decals, mugs and other accessories and the other will be a slightly higher price range that will have eight inch collectible action figures of popular Mukta Arts films. These will be made in limited number and each will be numbered. Some of them may also carry signatures of the artists who are being depicted. This aspect is yet to be finalised.”

Further talking about the launch and what to expect of the figures that will be developed, Chinchlikar continues, “In January we debuted the first two characters that were based on the characters Ram and Lakhan from the 1989 film. We debuted these two figures at the New York Toy Fair also since it coincided with the 32 years celebration of the film’s release.” Elaborating on the way forward, he adds, “Going forward we will feature a number of characters from Mukta Arts films like Karma, Saudagar, Karz, Khalnayak, Ram Lakhan, Hero and others. So it will take a while to set this up in terms of production, but we intend to bring old school charm to the audience with a modern twist.”