Unfortunately, it doesn’t appear that the episode will ever come to fruition because, in a recent interview with IndieWire, Shankar said that he’s heard from sources that The Simpsons is planning to instead quietly write the character off the show.  Back in April, The Simpsons attempted to address the growing controversy surrounding the character of Apu Nahasapeemapetilon with the episode, “No Good Read Goes Unpunished,” which was heavily criticized for not so much addressing the issue as basically dismissing it. “If you are a show about cultural commentary and you are too afraid to comment on the culture, especially when it’s a component of the culture you had a hand in creating, then you are a show about cowardice,” said Shankar. “It’s not a step forward, or step backwards, it’s just a massive step sideways. After having read all these wonderful scripts, I feel like sidestepping this issue doesn’t solve it when the whole purpose of art, I would argue, is to bring us together.” 
 
 Shankar who viewed his contest as an olive branch to the show, has picked a winning script from hundreds of submissions that he believes will be enjoyed by fans on both sides of the controversy. RIP My Mentions — Hari Kondabolu (@harikondabolu) October 27, 2018 
 
 For what it’s worth, the winning script that Shankar selected was written by Vishaal Buch, an Indian-American family doctor from Bethesda, Maryland, who envisioned Apu going from owning the Kwik-E-Mart to being a thriving businessman. The spec episode doesn’t just focus on Apu, but pulls in other prominent Indian Americans in hilarious ways to highlight the importance of diversity and individuality through the lens of “The Simpsons.” 
 
 “The contest was never meant to be an attack against anyone, but I think in a lot of ways we weren’t asking for anything too radical than to be viewed in three-dimensions,” said Shankar. We recognise that many of us are shopkeepers but are aware that not all of us are. It’s unclear whether Apu would have been voiced by Hank Azaria or an Indian-American voice actor, but either way, it sounds like a huge missed opportunity on Fox’s part.
– The Simpsons character Apu Nahasapeemapetilon, who has been criticized for promoting negative stereotypes about South Asians (and is voiced by white guy Hank Azaria), may be getting cut from the show. "I got some disheartening news back, that I’ve verified from multiple sources now: They’re going to drop the Apu character altogether," producer Adi Shankar tells IndieWire, claiming he heard the news from two people who work on the show and a third person who works directly with creator Matt Groening. "They aren’t going to make a big deal out of it, or anything like that, but they’ll drop him altogether just to avoid the controversy." Shankar was talking to IndieWire about Apu because he recently held a spec script contest for an episode dealing with the show's "Apu problem" and had been hoping Fox would agree to produce the script. Reached for comment, a rep for the show told IndieWire simply that "Apu appeared in the 10/14/18 episode 'My Way or the Highway to Heaven.'" IndieWire notes that the only shot Apu appears in during the episode is one in which dozens of characters are gathered around God. Comedian Hari Kondabolu, who made a recent documentary about Apu, responded to the news by tweeting, "There are so many ways to make Apu work without getting rid of him. If true, this sucks." The Daily Dot rounds up other critical and mournful responses on Twitter. Shankar, producer of films including Dredd and The Grey and co-showrunner of Castlevania on Netflix, plans to produce the winning script (which sees Apu going from Kwik-E-Mart owner to thriving businessman) himself on his Bootleg Universe YouTube page. (Here's what Azaria thinks should happen with Apu.)