Imran Zahid

From an Iraqi journalist who hurls a shoe at US President George Bush to a Bihari kingpin who leaks question papers to mint crores, actor Imran Zahid, Bokaro boy and Mahesh Bhatt discovery, is adding one complex role after another to his CV.

Zahid will now play Ranjit Kumar Singh alias Doctor Don in director Rakesh Ranjan Kumar’s film Marksheet.

Zahid, touted as a promising newcomer, played journalist-turned-activist Muntadhar Al Zaidi in Mahesh Bhatt’s theatre production The Last Salute. He will also play the lead role in a Bhatt production named Chandu, an eponymous film on the life of JNU student leader and Communist Party of India member Chandrashekhar Prasad, shot dead on March 31, 1997, during a political rally. Zahid has also been cast in Pooja Bhatt’s erotic thriller Jism 2.

It is, however, quite a challenge to play Doctor Don. Born into a peasant’s family in Khaddi Lodipur village at Nalanda, Bihar, Ranjit Kumar Singh’s is a fabled rags-to-riches story. He and his team leaked question papers of medical, engineering, banking and other key exams for individual fees ranging from Rs 4 lakh to Rs 15 lakh.

Doctor Don, as he was called, virtually destroyed the credibility of India’s premier educational institutions by leaking their question papers. The CBI in November 1993 finally nabbed him.

“Scripted by Monazir Alam, Marksheet will star Imran Zahid in the lead role,” said director Rakesh Ranjan Kumar, whose debut film Gandhi to Hitler, based on letters written by the Mahatma to Adolf Hitler, was well-received at the 64th Annual Cannes Film Festival and 61st Berlin International Film Festival.

Marksheet will go on floors this September and is likely to release in March 2013.

From the pages of history to a more contemporary education scam, the director has taken quite a leap.

“I am not making a biopic. The film is inspired by Doctor Don, but I will focus on the technical aspects of how the racket worked,” said Ranjan.

A fresh face opposite Zahid will be cast for Marksheet.

“It won’t be just an issue-based film. It will also be a love story. The movie will be mostly be shot around Delhi University. Parts of it will be filmed in Mumbai, Bangalore, Calcutta, Chandigarh, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. We are looking for a fresh-faced, Punjabi-looking girl for which auditions will start this month,” Ranjan told The Telegraph over the phone from Delhi.

Prodded on if the done-to-death love and crime mishmash will work, the director said: “This is an intelligent commercial Bollywood film. The story of a dejected youth who takes up crime has been filmed before. But this movie will deal with crime in education and its impact on society. Education-based crimes make meritocracy hollow.”