Did you know Paresh Rawal was the initial choice for Boman Irani's role in Munna Bhai MBBS?

By Ankita Bhalla

on June 06, 2018

Veteran actor Paresh Rawal is all set into the revered shoes of late Sunil Dutt in the film Sanju, a biopic on the latter's son, Sanjay Dutt. While Rawal would be working under Rajkumar Hirani's direction for the very first time, the actor, in a tete-e-tete about his new movie, revealed that he was offered a role in one of Hirani's hits years ago.

In a media interaction, Rawal revealed that he was offered the role of Dr. JC Asthana in Munnabhai MBBS initially but due to some reason couldn’t take it up. And thus, Boman Irani was later roped in to essay the character. However, the thespian played the same role in the Telugu remake of the 2003 hit comedy-drama, Dr. Ramalingeswara Rao.

A decade and a half later, when the opportunity of starring in a Hirani directorial came his way it was like double bonanza for Rawal, as he describes it.

When asked about playing the superstar of the era gone by, Rawal said, “Sunil Dutt does not have a characteristic mannerism like Sanjay Dutt. He does not have a typical way of walking and talking unlike his son. In all his films he never played himself, the only thing that comes across is his honesty.”

He further added, “He was a normal person with utmost honesty and projecting that honesty was difficult. His pain as a father, his nobility, his pain on his wife’s suffering, his son’s drug problem, the tension of getting his daughters married, the strife of political life, the death threats to his family and the political mudslinging that he bore is what makes him the man that he was. There was no sense of self-pity, he was a fighter, a man with such great dignity and such impeccable sense of value and the pain of the father was difficult to portray not the physical part. The fact that he (Sunil Dutt) and Nargis did so much for the country and then were labeled as miscreants due to the bomb blast case and he still overcame all this with his head held high was difficult.”

Desk: Aayushi Sharma