When I connected with Vikas Khanna over a Zoom call last weekend, it was 2am in New York. The world-renowned, Michelin-starred chef looked exhausted (“I’ve just come back from a promotional at Times Square,” he smiled), but once he got talking to The Telegraph about The Last Color — his first film as director, that released in cinemas on Friday after being screened at the Cannes Film Festival in 2019 and feted at film festivals worldwide — the 49-year-old metamorphosed into his usual energetic self, chatting about the highs of making a film (frontlined by Neena Gupta) that brings the marginalised to the forefront, and what prompted him to start the Feed India campaign that has now served meals to over 50 million Indians (and is still going strong) in this year of the pandemic.

The Last Color has done its rounds of film festivals, won many awards and even made itself eligible to be in contention for the Oscars. But finally being able to release it in India must be a different kind of high...

The story that was made for the people and made by the people... it’s now gone home to them finally (smiles). This film belongs to them. I feel bad that I couldn’t travel to India for the release, we are still under medical control and I have a big construction coming up here. I have no idea what it takes to release a movie, this is my first time (smiles).

Given how much you’ve travelled globally with the film, what’s the tenor of the response been like?

Haider, who runs the Global Fund for Widows, told me that this is the first time that someone has spoken so openly about widows. I became the ambassador for their foundation, and that has snowballed into the empowerment of many widows in Africa and India. Many people want to open schools in India because The Last Color talks about education for girls. I didn’t make it with any sort of mission, but things just fell into place. Many people felt that the originality of the story worked for them.

I made the story in the template I felt best... I didn’t want to listen to things that, ‘Story toh aisi hi honi chahiye’. For me, the heart has no boundaries. That’s what I did with my food as well. Americans didn’t want that kind of cuisine, but I told them that, ‘No, this is not how Indian food should be done’. We can’t break the cuisine just to please a small percentage of the world. It happened to so many cuisines that got modified here, and even we too had to adapt, but still I feel that thodi si integrity, honesty aur originality toh honi chahiye.

The Last Color moved me in many ways, in the way it combined the threads of caste division, marginalisation, indelible friendship, and of hopes and dreams being crushed and yet the power to rise above it all. At any point, did you feel like you were taking on too much for a debut feature?

I was at Lolark Kund (In Varanasi) and I saw these elderly parents who were forcing their daughter to go and have a bath there. They told her, ‘Jab tak nahin nahaayegi toh beta kaise karegi?’ And that crushed me so deeply. That image of them pushing her in didn’t leave my mind. Many people have told me that they didn’t get the closure of the threads when they watched it the first time. I didn’t spoon-feed anything to the audience, I wanted them to figure out things on their own. I wanted to do it like French cinema... just leave it open. You don’t always have to find closure. I wanted to show Chhoti (played by Aqsa Siddiqui) walk on that rope as a symbol of freedom, it was just one shot, but it said so much. Anarkali the transgender (Rudrani Chhetri) was an important character that had to be there in the film. I also wanted to show the hierarchy in widows’ ashrams and how Noor’s (played by Neena Gupta) roommate treats her badly.

We wrote the story for seven-eight years, and some felt it was too much for one film. But I feel they are all connected, and most importantly, they all felt connected to me. I hope you felt the originality of the film when you watched it. Sometimes I watch a film and I like it so much and later I realise it’s taken from somewhere and it breaks my heart. Like macaroni aur cheese mein jeera daal diya! (Laughs)

It looks like a very challenging film to make...

The climax took three days to shoot, there was so much coordination needed. I could write it very symbolically in the book (also called The Last Color), but in real-life, it was so tough. I am not a CG guy, I didn’t want to do it in post (production). The heat, the light, everything was against us. That scene took almost 200 people to coordinate. The scene was a culmination of Chhoti’s promise to Noor that she will bathe her in colour. It was a tough scene, even emotionally, for a child to do that. As a kid, I didn’t have the guts to call out tradition when I saw it happen to my aunts, but this child did.

Neena Gupta in The Last Color, now playing in theatres Sourced by the correspondent

It’s beautifully shot. Was there a specific colour palette you were aiming for?

Except for Neena Gupta who was in white, I wanted everything else to be in colour. In every shot she was in, there would be diyas somewhere. It took me so many years to write it, and I wanted to do it my way, I didn’t want anyone’s help or expertise. I think this is one of Neenaji’s best performances. The calmness, the no-make-up... she’s so pretty, and in this movie, she’s positively glowing.

I know that food will always be your first love. Is film-making going to be something you will keep going back to? I know that you have just announced a project called Rain with Shabana Azmi...

Yes, Rain is one of my biggest projects. Table-top cooking is too done, I feel. I have to do something new now. ‘Aaj hum paneer bhurji banayenge aur usko kathi roll mein daalenge’... I have been doing that for 30 years now, I need to adopt a different thought process now. I want to show how tough it is for Indian chefs to make it big internationally.

But you have always been innovative...

I didn’t like doing TV (culinary shows) too much. I saw the influence it had on millions, but TV is very difficult for me. Everything has to be Hindi mein and there are certain things you have to project. I respect TV a lot, but I find it very tough. I respect chefs who do TV so well, and I have to train 10 times more than them to be able to do it well. I can’t be at their level, like someone like Sanjeevji (Kapoor)... unki body language aur diction kamaal ki hain. On TV, I keep wondering, ‘Main kya kar raha hoon?!’ That’s why I have to keep finding new ways to express myself. I am welcomed with open arms, but I am a total misfit on TV (laughs).

The good thing is that I can memorise things very well, word by word. I learnt English watching American movies on headphones... I learn very fast. I can speak in a perfect American accent, but I have never done it, I speak like I have always spoken. I always choose my path differently.

Was there an epiphanic moment that made you launch Feed India, this huge humanitarian mission to feed India’s hungry millions that you have been doing for the last eight months?

It wasn’t my choice. My workload is too much at any given point of time. But this was my mom’s order to me. She told me that every time she watched someone go hungry in the pandemic, she had the feeling that her son turned his back and walked out. She told me, ‘You are a global name because everybody in this country contributed to you. Today, we are in pain, and I want my son to be in the middle of this battlefield and serve and feed India’. I won’t take any credit for it. It was her orders, and I simply became the guardian of it. I always do things with honesty, passion and obsession and that’s what Feed India has become for me. My mother rebooted my moral compass and I am grateful I did it in her honour.