Not Arjun Rampal, but this actor was supposed to play ‘Mukesh Mehra’ in Shah Rukh Khan's 'Om Shanti Om'

It’s hard to imagine anyone but Arjun Rampal playing the suave yet sinister ‘Mukesh Mehra’ in Om Shanti Om, but the role nearly went to another Bollywood name — Vivek Oberoi. Director Farah Khan has long admitted that casting for the 2007 blockbuster’s antagonist was a nightmare. “Casting for the role of Mukesh Mehra was the most difficult as it was a completely negative role, there was nothing positive about him,” she told in an earlier interview with us.


The team had a specific vision: Deepika Padukone’s on-screen love interest had to be conventionally good-looking, “probably even better-looking than Shah Rukh Khan.” Vivek was offered the role before Arjun but turned it down, not wanting to repeat a negative character after Company. Around the same time, he chose Apoorva Lakhia’s Shootout at Lokhandwala instead.

Farah & SRK’s last-minute scramble

By New Year’s Eve 2006, the film was set to start shooting in just days — and still had no villain. That’s when fate intervened at Shah Rukh Khan’s party. Farah and SRK cornered Arjun Rampal — quite literally in a bathroom — to pitch him the part. Initially, Arjun hesitated, calling it “too villainous,” especially with dark scenes like “burning the girl.”


But SRK refused to give up, personally convincing Arjun to trust both him and Farah. Arjun joined the film just two days before costume fittings, later recalling, “I’m glad I trusted both of them.”

No regrets for Vivek Oberoi

Vivek, for his part, has no bitterness about the opportunity lost. In Bollywood Hungama interview, when asked by a fan why he turned down Om Shanti Om, he said, “You can’t go back and change those decisions… you move forward.” The actor has also famously passed on Munnabhai MBBS, Hum Tum, and Bunty Aur Babli. As he puts it, “For the 10-odd films I let go which succeeded, there were 70 or 80… which failed.”






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