Bachchan also talked about his controversial land purchase in Barabanki, Uttar Pradesh (now a court case), where he is accused of declaring himself a farmer. Referring to this and the I-T case against him, Bachchan said he didn’t feel he was being targeted by the UPA regime. “There is the law, and everybody has to be in accordance with it, and that includes me. This is something (SP leader) Amar Singhji has taught me.”

The actor said he saw nothing wrong in the company he kept, especially in the context of the Uttar Pradesh elections, or in the advertisements he did praising the Samajwadi Party regime. “This was not a mistake. I did it because we are friends. The ads had to be sponsored by the party... why should public money be spent on it? Take the UP Development Council. I was not the only member on it....”

When asked if being a public figure of his reputation, he could have read the writing on the wall and realised that his UP advertisements were not going down well, he said: “It is not for me to make estimates of how people would read my appearance in those ads.... All that I said in those ads were figures on crime published by a ministry in the Central Government. I did not invent the numbers.”

He said he was available for even the state of Maharashtra if it chose to use him to promote itself. “Even the new government in UP can use the ads now, if it wants. They are still valid,” Bachchan said.