25 May,2026 06:19 PM IST | Mumbai | mid-day online correspondent
Ranveer Singh. Pic via Instagram
Amid the controversial dispute between actor Ranveer Singh and filmmaker Farhan Akhtar over their film Don 3, the Federation of Western India Cine Employees (FWICE), on Monday, announced its decision to ban the actor. The chairperson of FWICE, Ashoke Pandit, spoke to the media on Monday and revealed that Farhan had approached the workers' body after the actor's abrupt exit from his film.
During the conference, Ashoke Pandit stated, "On 11th April, Farhan Akhtar filed a complaint with the IFTDA, that's the Indian Film and Television Directorate Association, which I head. In his complaint, he said that he would like to come and meet and file a complaint against Ranveer Singh, the actor. The complaint very clearly said that just three weeks before the unit was supposed to leave for the shoot, Ranveer Singh withdrew from the film. So as a matter of rule, the federation invited Farhan Akhtar and Ritesh Sidhwani. Farhan Akhtar came on Zoom because he was in London, and Ritesh Sidhwani came to the office of the federation."
He added, "Within two hours, he explained the entire complaint of his. He told us a lot of things. We heard him. After that, as a matter of natural justice, as a rule, we also invited the other party to the federation every 10 days. A reminder was given to Ranveer Singh to come and present his side. Every 10 days, we invited him. As a rule, we had to inform, and we had to send an invitation three times."
"We tried three times to invite Ranveer Singh, but we didn't get any response from him. When we announced the press conference, we got an email from him stating that our federation doesn't fall in the jurisdiction of the entire issue. It said, ‘Your body has no reason to get involved in this matter'," Ashoke Pandit revealed. He shared that the film body had issued a ‘non-cooperative directive' against the actor, which will likely affect his work scenario.
Birendra Nath Tiwari, another member of FWICE added, "When a film is made, thousands of our workers get employed. And when a film is suddenly stopped, their employment gets affected. Yeh bahut bada nuksaan hota hai. The federation fights for the rights of the workers and also takes care of the producers. We have never taken one-sided decisions. If a producer gets affected, we have to stand by him."
He added, "We feel that the message should go to the industry ki koi superstar niyam se bada nahin hai. Hence, we have put in place a non-cooperation directive against Ranveer from this very day. We would like to inform all the workers and associations that until the dispute is not solved and until Ranveer Singh doesn't meet us, this directive will remain in place. Since this is about the rights of a producer, I would request the producer associations to also lend their support."
Similarly, Ashok Dubey said, "All our members would not work with Ranveer, be it director, cameraman, spotboy, lightman etc."
