Wanted to explore villain inside me with 'Omerta': Rajkummar Rao

Actor Rajkummar Rao, who is busy promoting his upcoming film "Omerta", says that he wanted to explore his villainous side with this film.

Rajkummar interacted with media during the promotion of the film on Friday.

Asked that what prompted him to play the dark character of terrorist Omar Saeed Sheikh, he said: "As an actor, we get very fascinated with villains sometimes. If you see, Shah Rukh (Khan) sir has played grey or negative characters in 'Baazigar' and 'Darr', Aamir (Khan) sir in 'Earth', Sanjay Dutt in 'Khalnayak' and recently Ranveeer Singh in 'Padmaavat'."

"There is something edgy about these villains that we get attracted to as an artist.

"I don't know if it's about the power these characters has or the limitless approach that these characters have that we want to explore and it was same with me. I think I wanted to explore this villain inside me with film like 'Omerta'," he added.

Talking about the basic plot of the film, Rajkummar said: "'Omerta' means silence between the two people regarding certain thing and which they don't share with anyone else so in gangster term it is called 'Omerta'.

"It's a story of Omar Saeed Sheikh and many young people like him who gets brainwashed and become a part of terrorist activities," he added.

"Omerta" is a biographical crime drama film directed by Hansal Mehta and stars Rajkummar in the role of Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, British terrorist of Pakistani descent.

The film explores the 1994 kidnappings of Westerners in India for which Omar was arrested and served time in prison and the plotting of murder of Wall Street journalist Daniel Pearl in 2002.

It was screened in the Special Presentations section at the 2017 Toronto International Film Festival, the Mumbai Film Festival and the Florence Film Festival.

"Omerta" is scheduled to release on April 20.