Rawal made the claim on a podcast with Vickey Lalwani, saying he had developed the concept and screenplay together with director Amit Rai, only for the project to take a different direction once Akshay Kumar came on board — and for him to receive no credit for originating the idea. Rawal said that once producers Ashwin Varde and Vipul Shah of Optimystix entered the picture and Akshay's involvement was finalised, he told Rai directly that he didn't want to proceed and wouldn't fight over it, effectively stepping back from a project he said was originally his own.

Varde responded with a detailed statement, calling Rawal's allegations "shocking, untrue and unsubstantiated" and saying he had no option but to set the record straight publicly. According to Varde, it was veteran actor Pavan Malhotra who first recommended Amit Rai's name to him. When he heard Rai's story, Varde said it immediately reminded him of the original OMG — Oh My God!, and Rai explained the resemblance wasn't accidental — Rawal himself had reportedly asked Rai to keep the narrative close to the original OMG's format, given the camaraderie the two had built while working together on an earlier film, Road to Sangam.

Varde said his central concern from the start was franchise ownership, since the OMG IP rights belonged to Akshay Kumar, meaning any sequel-style project couldn't proceed without either Kumar's involvement or his explicit approval. He alleged that what Rawal had actually been attempting was to make an OMG-style film under a different title without Kumar attached — something Varde described as unethical — and pushed back directly on the "no credit" framing, arguing that Rawal's account misrepresents how the project actually came together.

The dispute adds a new layer to an already public falling-out between Rawal and Kumar's camp this year, following Rawal's dramatic exit from and eventual return to Hera Pheri 3 — a separate controversy that had already put a spotlight on the working relationship between the two veteran actors. Director Priyadarshan had previously downplayed talk of any real rift between Rawal and Kumar in that dispute, attributing the chaos to unspecified outside pressure rather than any conflict between the two men themselves.

Rawal has not yet issued a public response to Varde's statement. Whether the two sides reach any further public reconciliation — as eventually happened with the Hera Pheri 3 dispute — remains to be seen.