Subhash Ghai's Saudagar is remembered 24 years later as much for its freshfaced debutante Manisha Koirala as it is for its fresh on-screen classic jodi of Dilip Kumar and Raaj Kumar. The veteran actors played Veer Singh aka Veeru and Rajeshwar Singh aka Raju whose friendship transcends class differences and whose enmity spills across generations.

It was Ghai's third film with Dilip Kumar after Vidhaata and Karma, and he admits that the idea of pairing the thespian with Raaj Kumar came to him by chance when he was working on this story of three generations separated by a feud. Since his childhood idol had insisted on a bound script the first time he'd approached him for Vidhaata, Ghai completed this one before narrating it to Dilip Kumar. “Dilip saab had just one question for me: 'Who's playing my friend in the film?' He didn't say a word when I said Raaj Kumar,“ reminisces Ghai.

The filmmaker then took his project to Raaj Kumar and asked him forthright if he had any objections to doing a film with Dilip Kumar. The actor raised an eyebrow and retorted, “Why would I have any objections? Jaani, he's my biggest inspiration.“ And Ghai had a casting coup! Thirty-two years after S S Vasan's Paigham in '59 in which they had played brothers, Dilip Kumar and Raaj Kumar reunited on screen.

Manisha Koirala, who made her debut in the film opposite Vivek Mushran, recalls filming the song, Imli ka boota, on her first day of shoot with the two legends. Dilip Kumar, ever the considerate costar, came up to her afterwards and told her, “You are very good.“

Raaj Kumar, despite his gruff exterior and a reputation for being eccentric, was just as reassuring to the young girl from Nepal who was playing his granddaughter Radha. “He's so soft in the inside,“ Manisha described him later with fond affection.

Ghai pampered the duo as much as he did his debutants. And his unit started calling them Chunnu and Munnu behind their backs. “They got to know about their nicknames rather late in the day from a spot boy and laughed indulgently at our childishness,“ Ghai smiles. The Laxmikant Pyarelal number, Imli ka boota, became very popular but the song Saudagar is remembered for is undoubtedly Ilu Ilu. Ghai admits that when he was studying at the Film and Television Institute in Pune, he would often bump into a pretty girl called Rehana who lived in the same lane. Soon, he started courting her, away from the vigilant eyes of her grandfather and father, through little love notes which always ended with Ilu Ilu.

When they were working on the score of Saudagar, he told his composer duo and lyricist Anand Bakshi that for the young lovers, Vivek and Manisha, he wanted a song that went Ilu Ilu.

Intrigued Bakshi asked him, “Yeh Ilu Ilu kya hai?“ to which Ghai replied, “Ilu ka matlab I love you.“ And Bakshi quipped, “We have our mukhda.“

Ghai surprised everyone by wrapping up his ambitious film in just 11 months. When Rehana, who is now his better half, saw Ilu Ilu, playing on screen, she turned to her husband and with an admonishing smile told him, “You are very naughty.“