SRK was the first choice for RAVAN

Mani Ratnam had first approached Khan for the role that is now being essayed by Abhishek Bachchan

Before Abhishek Bachchan stepped into Mani Ratnam's Ravan, the director had approached Shah Rukh Khan for the role. Sources reveal that Mani wanted to have SRK and Ash as the leading pair of his bilingual film.

We hear that the Chennai-based director called SRK and told him about the film. Shah Rukh said that he was interested and that they would meet at a later date for the narration.

Long delay

A source says, "Not many know that Shah Rukh was the first choice. Mani had written the script keeping him in mind.

Also, when Mani approached Ash she suggested that he should approach SRK for the role opposite her."

However it was not meant to be. There was a long delay following the initial discussion between the director and the actor, and in the meantime he committed his dates to Aditya Chopra.

When asked if he had indeed been the first choice for the AbhiAsh starrer, Shah Rukh says after a pause, "Yes Mani sir had spoken to me.

Actually there were two reasons I had just said yes to him. I had given up on Idiots or they had thrown me out of Idiots anyway you want to look at it and Robots had fallen through with Shankar.

So both films were not happening and I had time. Mani sir said he had a project for me and we decided to chat about it when he came to Bombay.

But unfortunately by the time we sat on it, Adi had already approached me for Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi and I had committed to it. But I would have loved to work with Mani sir any time