The reincarnation drama Karan Arjun, directed and produced by Rakesh Roshan, is one of the biggest hits of the Hindi film industry in the 1990s. The film is based on two brothers Karan Singh and Arjun Singh, who are killed along with their father by their greedy uncle Thakur Durjan Singh, but are then reborn as Ajay and Vijay to seek their revenge.
The two superstars Salman Khan and Shah Rukh Khan played the dual roles of Karan Singh-Ajay and Arjun Singh-Vijay, respectively. Amrish Puri played the main antagonist Thakur Durjan Singh, while Raakhee was seen as Karan and Arjun's mother Durga Singh, whose one-liner 'Mere Karan Arjun aayenge' got ingrained in the Bollywood pop culture.
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But do you know that before Shah Rukh and Salman came on board, Rakesh Roshan had considered multiple actors to play the titular roles in the 1995 film? As per the IMDb trivia page, the sibling pair of Sunny Deol and Bobby Deol were also in contention to play the leading roles in the blockbuster film.
When Karan Arjun was initially titled Kaynaat, Rakesh Roshan wanted to make the film with real-life brothers. He had also shared the script with Sunny Deol, who loved it. But, the Gadar 2 actor declined the film when he got to know that Roshan wants Bobby as the second leading hero as he thought that Bobby, who had not even made his Bollywood debut by then, would go unnoticed in the film because of his own presence.
What's even more interesting is the fact that Sunny and Bobby's real names are Ajay and Vijay, the same names that Karan and Arjun are given in their rebirth.
Karan Arjun had Kajol and Mamta Kulkarni as the two leading ladies paired opposite Shah Rukh and Salman, respectively. The film also featured Johnny Lever, Ranjeet, Aasif Sheikh, Ashok Saraf, Jack Gaud, and Arjun Firoz Khan in key roles.
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