Former India captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni was shocked to hear about Sushant Singh Rajput's death.
'We can't believe what happened. I am not in a position to express my grief. Mahi is also very morose. Such a tragic incident,' Arun Pandey, one of Dhoni's close friends and co-producer of M.S. Dhoni: The Untold Story, told the ABP Ananda television channel.
Sushant played Dhoni in the film, which was directed by Neeraj Pandey and went on to become a hit.
Sushant spent time with the cricketer at his Ranchi home to prep for the role and Arun Pandey said the actor's penchant for detail helped him immensely in playing Dhoni in reel life.
'One day he (Sushant) was practising the helicopter shot and he suffered a strain. We thought he would take some rest and come back after a while,' Arun Pandey recalled, 'but he said "There should not be delay because of me" and was back practising that shot in a week's time.'
Such was his dedication that by the end of the movie shoot, Pandey added, Sushant had become more than a decent cricketer, something Dhoni acknowledged.
"He used to ask Mahi a lot of questions, the little things that make the difference,' Pandey remembered. 'The fact they both had a Bihar connection also helped them develop a bond.'
Dhoni was born in July 1981 in Ranchi, then in undivided Bihar -- it is now the capital of Jharkhand state. Sushant was born in January 1986 in Patna, Bihar's capital.
