For an actor who scaled all possible highs in his craft, and who remains the benchmark for all actors who came after, it was a baffling decision to make. More so when you consider that right from his early days, Dilip Kumar showed a propensity to take on films that many other actors would have balked at. The choice becomes that much more inexplicable when you consider how he prided himself on being selective about his choice of roles, at least in the first phase of his career, and that he himself said, ‘I took roles early on in my career that other actors would probably have taken up later, as they dealt with emotionally sensitive topics. They would have taken up such roles after they were well-established in the industry. I, on the other hand, took such roles from the very beginning.’

Dilip Sahab’s no was Omar Sharif’s yes

We are referring to the thespian’s decision to walk away from David Lean’s 1962 epic Lawrence of Arabia. As his biographer Faisal Farooqui says in his new book, In the Shadow of a Legend, ‘David Lean admired Dilip Sahab and had watched many of his movies and truly believed that no one could play the character of Ali better than Sahab. He stayed at Sahab’s house for weeks and tried to convince him to agree to do the film.’ But to no avail. The role eventually went to Omar Sharif who became a global sensation after the film released. It rankles that much more because Ali’s (Omar Sharif) entry in the film has been voted as one of the greatest moments of cinema history by a number of polls.

However, as Dilip Kumar confided to Faisal Farooqui, ‘Why be a small fish in a big pond, when you can be a big fish in a small pond.… Every action I take, I do so after putting in a lot of thought into it. I don’t regret my decisions. Besides, why do you think that Lawrence of Arabia would have been successful if I had been part of it?’

First choice to play Thakur in Sholay

And though he does not regret not being part of Lean’s film, there are a few others that he bemoaned having said no to: Baiju Bawra, Zanjeer and Sholay. Yes, believe it or not, he was the first choice to play Thakur in Sholay but refused it because he believed it lacked ‘variety’! Sanjeev Kumar – who first made his mark as an actor in a film opposite Dilip Kumar (Sungharsh, 1968) – grabbed the role with both hands (pun intended) and the rest is history.

But then therein lies the fascination for film projects that don’t turn out as they were envisaged or are canned after being announced with a lot of fanfare or never see the light of day even after they are completed or, as in this case, where someone else steps into the role. Consider, for example, Saawan Kumar Tak’s film on Mirza Ghalib starring Amitabh Bachchan, announced during the star’s early days in Bombay. What would the filmmaker – known for his take on ‘the other woman’ in films like Souten – have made of Amitabh Bachchan as Ghalib? Or Gulzar’s take on Devdas with Dharmendra in the eponymous role. Or for that matter, Danny Denzongpa as Gabbar Singh in Sholay. These are the perennial ‘what ifs’ that make the cinema story so fascinating.

Dilip Kumar in and as 'Devdas'. YouTube

Pyaasa was all geared up for Dilip Kumar. But the star never arrived

Dilip Kumar was also the first choice to play the poet in Guru Dutt’s Pyaasa (1957). After having shot portions of the film, the director was having second thoughts about playing the character. And given his penchant for intense, tragic roles, Dilip Kumar would have been perfect for it. It has been speculated that the tragedy king thought the character was too similar to the one he had played in Devdas and passed. Faisal Farooqui too quotes Dilip Kumar as telling him, ‘It was another depressing story. I had to refuse. I didn’t have any other option.’ But there’s more to the story.

As reported by Yasser Usman in his book on Guru Dutt, Dilip Kumar agreed to do the film and quoted his fee of Rs 1.5 lakh. Guru Dutt had meanwhile scrapped a considerable part of the film he had shot and requested the star to reduce the fee. Dilip Kumar told him not to worry about the money and assured him that now that he was part of the film his ‘loyal distributors would take care of the finances’. However, Guru Dutt himself had his own team of distributors to whom he had promised the film and there was no way he could go back on his word. In Sathya Saran’s book Ten Years with Guru Dutt, Abrar Alvi says that Guru Dutt told Dilip Kumar, ‘I haven’t come to you to sell my film. I can sell it on my own. I have come to you as a director, because I believe that if I cast you in my film, I will make a better film. You will add stature to it.’

Was Dilip Kumar offended? No one knows. He promised to come for the shoot. The next day, the unit of Pyaasa was all geared up and waiting for Dilip Kumar. But the star never arrived.

It is interesting to ponder on what Dilip Kumar would have brought to the character in Pyaasa. Given his mastery over tragedy, there is no doubt that he would have been ideal for the role. And Guru Dutt, at his best, was limited in his range as an actor. However, given Dilip Kumar’s larger-than-life aura, it is quite likely that Pyaasa would have ended up becoming more a star vehicle than what it stands as now – a well-rounded social critique that takes into its ambit the world around the poet as much as his personal anguish.

Opting out of Sangam: wary of working with Raj Kapoor again

The other big film that came Dilip Kumar’s way and that he decided to opt out of was Raj Kapoor’s Sangam. Raj Kapoor had offered him the role of Gopal (Raj Kapoor’s friend in the film eventually essayed by Rajendra Kumar) whom Sundar (Raj Kapoor) suspects of having an affair with his wife Radha (Vyjayanthimala). The two stars had worked in Mehboob Khan’s Andaz (1949) and the Showman had initially planned Sangam, then titled Gharonda, with the same cast as Andaz: Dilip Kumar, Nargis and himself. However, Dilip Kumar had nursed some misgivings about being dealt a bad hand in Andaz – surprising because he had a meaty role with some of the most popular songs in the film shot on him – and was wary of working with Raj Kapoor again. Kapoor on his part went on to offer him the choice of either Gopal or Sundar. Dilip Kumar, however, would not consent. What the star would have brought to the film remains in the realms of imagination. It is quite interesting to visualise Dilip Kumar as the flamboyant Sundar with Raj Kapoor playing the more brooding, more Dilip Kumar-like character of Gopal.

The role played by Amitabh Bachchan in Baghban was originally planned for Dilip Kumar. YouTube

Amitabh Bachchan’s role in Baghban

Then there’s Ravi Chopra’s Baghban – yes, the one where the character played by Amitabh Bachchan wins the ‘Booker’s’ Prize for a memoir, in Hindi, published by London’s New Wave Publication House. If the film felt dated and anachronistic even in 2003, it is probably because it was originally planned by the director’s father B.R. Chopra with Dilip Kumar in the lead. And though Amitabh Bachchan and Hema Malini floored the audience and the film went on to become a big hit, it never shakes off the feeling that it belonged to another era – that of Dilip Kumar in his prime.

‘Today you have to choose between bad and horrible films… which is why I decided to give up acting’

However, the one film that the legendary actor would probably have most regretted not seeing the light of day is Kalinga, his maiden directorial venture, at least officially so. Given that film folklore has it that he was the one who directed Ganga Jumna (1961) and even parts of Ram Aur Shyam (1967), it had always been surprising that he did not take on the mantle of the director, earlier and more often.

In the 1990s, in the aftermath of the criticism he garnered for films like Dharm Adhikari (1986), the star went on record, as reported in Dilip Kumar: Peerless Icon Inspiring Generations, to express his disappointment for the kind of films that were being made. ‘Selectiveness has been my hallmark from the beginning… (but) today you cannot choose between good and bad films. You have to choose between bad and horrible films. So can you blame me for choosing the bad films? Our films are also becoming like fast food… no time to concentrate, no atmosphere to imbibe, absorb and deliver. Which is why I decided to give up acting.’

Directing offered a way out of the impasse and the opportunity came when producer Sudhakar Bokade persuaded Dilip Kumar to direct a film that the actor had written. Bokade had earlier produced another of the star’s forgettable 1990s outings, Izzatdaar, and enjoyed a good equation with him. In fact, when Izzatdaar’s director, K. Bapaiah, fell ill before a major schedule, it was Dilip Kumar who took over. Bokade was so impressed by the manner in which the star handled the situation that he decided then and there to ask Dilip Kumar to direct a film.

The Kalinga drama

Produced under the banner Divya-Citizen Combine (Citizen Film, Dilip Kumar’s home production house, had earlier produced Ganga Jumna, while Divya Films was Bokade’s banner), the film was launched with a lot of fanfare.

However, by 1992, the film was beginning to go off the rails. The relationship between the director and producer soured with Bokade even blaming Dilip Kumar for the film going over budget. Things looked up briefly in the mid-1990s when well-wishers got together and negotiated a truce between the two, leading to a joint press conference announcing the revival of the film. But by then cinematographer Kamal Bose and actor Amjad Khan had passed away, Meenakshi Sheshadri had married and left filmdom, while Raj Kiran had gone missing. Nothing quite came of the film after that.

Those who have seen the film have spoken highly of it and Dilip Kumar’s flair for highly-emotional scenes and feel for visual grandeur. The star himself was hugely invested in it. He confided to the authors of Dilip Kumar: Peerless Icon Inspiring Generations, ‘I have not only been directing but also overseeing the production details which can be a tricky business. I may have prepared myself for an emotional scene but the production manager might tell me that because of unavoidable reasons I would have to shoot an action scene instead.… Apart from that the colour texturing of the film has always been important to me. In Ganga Jumna, I tried for very earthy colours. I used the forests and the mountains to give the film a naturalistic look. In Kalinga, I have tried to ensure that colour should not dominate a scene but blend into the visuals… the scenes set in the desert and the ruins should be easy on the eye. I am a perfectionist and believe in maintaining the tempo of the film through the right temperature of individual scenes to create a cohesive whole…’

In mid-2021 came reports of producer Sangeeta Ahir working full swing to complete Kalinga. The producer is reported to have said that as much as eight hours of footage were being digitised, and work was in progress on the background score and colour grading. She also spoke of the film boasting of Amjad Khan’s best performance after Sholay, and that contrary to reports that Kalinga had only been partially shot, they had an excess of footage. Whether Kalinga will ever be available for public viewing is anybody’s guess.

Akhri Mughal to Zabardast

There are a number of other films starring the thespian that had been announced at one point or the other. These include one on Bahadur Shah Zafar by K. Asif, titled Akhri Mughal, based on a Kamal Amrohi script which J.P. Dutta was keen to revive at one time as Abhishek Bachchan’s debut film. There’s also what could have been the zabardast blockbuster of the 1980s, Nasir Husain’s multi-starrer titled Zabardast which cast Dilip Kumar as the father of Dharmendra and Rishi Kapoor. But that, as they say, is a story for another day.

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Shantanu Ray Chaudhuri is a film and music buff, editor, publisher, film critic and writer. Books commissioned and edited by him have won the National Award for Best Book on Cinema twice and the inaugural MAMI Award for Best Writing on Cinema