Remember the popular song Naayak Nahin Khal Nayak Hoon Main? These lyrics from the Khal Nayak (1993) title track actually led director Subhash Ghai to conceive and create the cult film.

“The whole film was written with the thought that every villain knows who a good man is. That’s why, I always call the antagonist, the tragic hero of the film. And because I wanted to bring this theme out well on screen, casting was the most difficult part,” says Ghai, who also co-wrote the film.

The filmmaker recalls how many stars, including actors from his past projects Jackie Shroff, Rishi Kapoor and Anil Kapoor, wanted to work on Khal Nayak. “It was challenging for me to find the right fit,” says the filmmaker, sharing why he finally chose Sanjay Dutt over the others.

“Sanju asked me why I chose him, and I told him it’s because of his eyes. Uski aankhon mein ek bholapan hai. But in the very next moment, you see a man who’s full of anger,” he elaborates.

But that was not all. The 78-year-old says that another crucial factor was that he wanted an actor “who would completely surrender to the director”. It was the “principal character” and Ghai adds, “I wanted to get it right. I enacted each and every scene for Sanju. I wanted to make the character unpredictable. Yeh abhi pyaar karega ya maar dega, pata nahin lagta. Fortunately, he played the character exactly how I asked him to.”

To make Dutt look unpredictable, Ghai had to improvise some scenes last-minute. He recalls, “There’s a scene when he goes to jail to meet a guy and talks nicely. But as Sanju’s character hugs him, woh uska gala daba kar usse maar deta hai. Not many people on the set were aware of this and were quite surprised.”

He also reveals, “In Choli Ke Peeche, we decided to improvise and added a patch to Sanjay Dutt’s eye to bring more drama to the scene. And I think that worked well as it looked really good on screen.”