'Animal' director reveals the reason behind Bobby Deol's controversial character

Bobby Deol's portrayal in Sandeep Reddy Vanga's blockbuster "Animal" has resonated well with the audience. In this film, he takes on a negative role, and interestingly, his character is depicted as a Muslim. In recent interaction with media, director Sandeep shared the logic behind the decision to assign his character a Muslim identity.

While giving an interview he said that Abrar is a Muslim, even though he belongs to a family of Sikhs. In the film, Abrar is the cousin of the protagonist, Rannvijay Singh. Further, he explained that he wanted Bobby's character to convert because of the personal trauma in his back story. He said, “I’ve seen people when they enter a zone of zero confidence, people will come and say to them, ‘Go to a church, or go to a baba, he’ll give some taweez (pendant), change your name…’ I’ve seen people changing their religion because so much has happened to them. At a low point, they feel like it’s a new birth, it’s a change of identity completely… We see a lot of people converting to Islam and Christianity; we never see anybody converting to Hinduism."

Sandeep explained that the concept provided him with the opportunity to depict Abrar as a character with multiple wives and children. He expressed that by incorporating this element, he could introduce a larger and more intricate storyline, involving multiple cousins with distinct personalities. Sandeep clarified that there was no intention to portray a negative image of Muslims but rather to enhance the complexity of the drama.

On work front Bobby made his Bollywood debut with the 1995 film 'Barsaat', co-starring Twinkle Khanna. He has starred in films like 'Soldier', 'Badal', 'Gupt', 'Race 3', 'Jhoom Barabar Jhoom' and 'Ab Tumhare Hawale Watan Saathiyo' among others. However, his career petered out somewhere in the late 2000s. After a long gap, he made a comeback in 2018's 'Race 3', following up with 'Class of '83' and a hit series 'Aashram'. 'Love Hostel' also made the best possible use of Bobby's skills, casting him as a silent assassin named Dagar.