Based on the 1999 Kargil war, the coming-of-age war drama film Lakshya was released in 2004. The Farhan Akhtar directorial starred Hrithik Roshan as an aimless young man Karan Shergill, who goes through a transformational journey in his life after joining the Indian Army. The movie also starred Amitabh Bachchan and Preity Zinta in the leading roles.
Though Lakshya wasn't successful at the box office, it has attained its cult following over the years and is often counted among Hrithik's best performance in his career. But do you know that the director, producer, singer, and actor Farhan originally wanted a superstar to play the leading man in his film?
As per several media reports, Farhan Akhtar had approached Aamir Khan for Lakshya. Aamir had starred in Farhan's first directorial Dil Chahta Hai, along with Saif Ali Khan and Akshaye Khanna in 2001, and thus, the filmmaker wanted to work with him again in his second film but Khan rejected the film.
After starring in two cult classics namely Farhan's Dil Chahta Hai and Ashutosh Gowarikar's Lagaan in 2001, Aamir was preparing himself for Ketan Mehta's Mangal Pandey: The Rising, for which he grew his long hair and moustache. Thus, he refused to sign any new movie till the historical biographical war drama was completely shot and said no to Farhan. Mangal Pandey hit theatres in 2005.
Coming back to Lakshya, the film featured an ensemble cast consisting of Boman Irani, Lillete Dubey, MK Raina, Kushal Punjabi, Sharad Kapoor, Ranvir Shorey, Nawab Shah, Aditya Srivastava, Sushant Singh, Raj Zutshi, and Amrish Puri amongst others. Prabhu Deva won the National Film Award for Best Choreography for the song Main Aisa Kyun Hoon for the Hrithik Roshan-starrer Farhan Akhtar's Lakshya.
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