Chennai, June 13 (IANS): Actor-filmmaker Kamal Haasan has confirmed filling in for "extremely ill" T.K. Rajeev Kumar, the original director of "Sabash Naidu".

To avoid any delay in the filmmaking, Kamal will be directing the Tamil-Telugu-Hindi, trilingual film, which for the first time will feature him and his daugher and actress Shruti together.

"My director, Rajeev has taken extremely ill. The unfortunate setback occurred when we were on the fourth day of our recce in Los Angeles. He has been diagnosed with a Lyme disease. It is a rare infection prevalent in Europe and North America. This is the reason why I am now directing the film," Kamal said in a statement.

"Rajeev is getting the best possible medical care in LA. We have put him in one of the best hospitals with one of our executives keeping vigil 24/7," he added.

In the film, Kamal plays a RAW operative and the role is based on Balram Naidu, the popular character from 2010 Tamil film "Dasavatharam".

The film, which will also star actors Ramya Krishnan, Brahmanandam, Saurabh Shukla and Roger Narayanan, is being simultaneously shot in Tamil, Telugu and Hindi.