Good news for Amazon Prime video subscribers! Vidya Balan’s Shakuntala Devi to soon be on Prime Video! A day after it was announced that Amitabh Bachchan and Ayushmann Khurrana’s Gulabo Sitabo would be released on Amazon Prime Video in June, the OTT platform took to Twitter on Friday to announce that Vidya Balan-starrer Shakuntala Devi would also be launched digitally. However, no official release date has been announced at the moment.

Actor Amit Sadh, who is also playing a key role in the film, also tweeted the announcement, saying that he was “thrilled” that the movie team would be able to entertain viewers even during a global health crisis.

The decision has come most likely due to the fact that the COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in the temporary closure of cinema halls and movie theaters across the country in order to prevent the spread of the virus

The film also stars Sanya Malhotra of Dangal fame and Jisshu Sengupta in important roles, according to a report by news agency PTI.

Shakuntala Devi, directed and written by Anu Menon, is a biopic on the Guinness World Record holding Mathematician who was known as the human computer for her exceptional mental calculating capabilities. The movie has been produced by Vikram Malhotra and Sony Pictures Network Productions.

According to Menon, no one could portray the wisdom and wit of the mathematician better than Balan. She was further quoted by PTI as saying that Shakuntala Devi had an unparalleled passion for Maths and she lived ahead of her times, on her own terms.

The film was scheduled to hit the big screens on May 8, but that plan was cancelled due to the pandemic.

Apart from Gulabo Sitabo and Shakuntala Devi, five films in four South Indian languages will also be released on Amazon Prime Video, according to film trade analyst Komal Nahta. Tamil film Ponmagal Vandhal, Telugu film Penguin, Kannada language films Law and Biryani as well as Malayalam film Sufiyum Sujatayum will be released exclusively on the OTT platform across the world, Nahta tweeted. This shows that the trend of releasing titles directly onto the OTT platforms is catching up with South India, with the film industries down south rushing to ensure that they can also reach their viewers during the pandemic and do not end up losing the audience to other modes of entertainment.