TV actor Manish Goel to play Vikas Dubey in Hanak

The makers of Hanak, which is based on the life of the dreaded gangster-turned-politician Vikas Dubey, have unveiled the first look of Manish Goel, who plays the lead role.

The actor, who bears very little resemblance to Dubey, is seen in a white kurta and a dhoti with a big orange tikka smeared on his forehead.

Goel has been working in the Indian television industry for nearly two decades and will make his Hindi cinema debut with this film, the shooting for which commenced on Sunday in Bhopal. Manish Vatssalya, the director of Scotland (2019), is helming the project.

Speaking about casting Goel as Dubey, the film's creative producer, Ketki Pandit Mehta, said, "Manish Goel has a very good family man image in the television world and to turn him into a hardened criminal, the team did a lot of hard work and research. His look has been matched with several photographs of Vikas Dubey which we picked up from the internet. Manish has also worked tremendously on his mannerisms, body language, and accent."

Hanak has been produced by Mohaan Nadaar and Amit P Gupta and co-produced by Akash P Gupta and Himanshu Shah.