Nikkhil Advani has started filming for Sony LIV’s upcoming political thriller series Freedom at Midnight, based on the eponymous book by Dominique Lapierre and Larry Collins, the Kal Ho Naa Ho director announced on social media on Tuesday.

“Freedom At Midnight by Dominique Lapierre and Larry Collins. Sacrifice of many. Ambition of one. Shoot Begins,” Nikkhil, the showrunner and producer for the show, wrote on Instagram, sharing a collage featuring a clapperboard, the book, a logo of the production house and a snap of the script.

Based on the aforementioned non-fiction book, which begins with the appointment of British India’s last viceroy, Lord Mountbatten, Freedom at Midnight will chronicle important political events that took place in the final year of the country’s struggle for independence.

The storyline will reportedly end with Mahatma Gandhi’s assassination and funeral the following year.

The series stars Chirag Vohra (Gandhi), Sidhant Gupta (Jawaharlal Nehru), Rajendra Chawla (Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel) and Luke McGibney (Lord Louis Mountbatten) in lead roles.

Freedom at Midnight will be co-produced by Studio Next, an independent business unit of Sony Pictures Networks India.

Touted as ‘a riveting emotional tale of an incident that altered the course of the nation’, the series was first announced by Nikkhil in June last year.

“Freedom at Midnight is an authentic narrative of the country’s struggle and success for independence...The book...is one of the most notable reads about the event that brings out the unknown facts about the incident and what ensued thereon,” Danish Khan, the Head of Sony Entertainment Television, Sony LIV and Studio Next, said in a statement.

Nikkhil had previously collaborated with Sony LIV for the biological series Rocket Boys, outlining the lives of two Indian physicists, Homi J. Bhabha and Vikram Sarabhai, responsible for the nation’s first nuclear test, Pokhran I, in 1974.