As he gets set to surrender before TADA court in Mumbai later on Thursday, amid havans and prayers, it took exactly a month and a half for Sanjay Dutt to turn the archetypal stand-up comedian in a typical Bollywood flick from the archetypical hero in a film just as typical.

On March 28, when he addressed the media in Mumbai after the supreme court verdict handing him a five-year jail term in the 1993 Bombay serial blasts case, he seemed to be enacting in real life the role of additional commissioner of police SS Khan.

Dutt’s emotional address seemed only a recap that you had not seen in the film Shootout at Lokhandwala: a mustachioed hunk in tight tees, making it clear that looking back — either in anger or despair — was not an option for him.

“I am a law-abiding citizen and respect the law with highest respect for the supreme court and its decision. I will abide by all the terms and conditions put forward in the court order and I will surrender in a time frame given in the court order,” he had said.

As if to buttress the point further, he stressed, "I have not applied for pardon. There are others who deserve pardon. Since I am not going for pardon, there should not be any debate over this.”

And finally, as if readying for the climax shot, Dutt hugged his sister, Congress MP Priya Dutt, who sat next to him, and hiding his tears, said, “I love my country and I love the citizens of this country.” In film parlance, that would be the penultimate shot, the last one being one where the camera pans to the fading image of the siblings walking away.

You can almost visualise the audience cheer and pick out the wolf whistles. “Aadmi khatam, toh file khatam,” as he had said in Shootout in Lokhandwala.

On May 15, the same man, still with the same moustache who would still don the same tight tee with panache, seemed to have metamorphosed into a character from his other hit film of recent years: Munnabhai. No, not Munnabhai himself but Circuit, or possibly a worse fringe character, as the supreme court allowed him to withdraw his application seeking to surrender at Yervada jail in Pune, and not a TADA court in Mumbai, to serve the remainder of his sentence in the serial blasts case.

Is this the same man who had pronounced, and won over a nation, declaring, in no uncertain terms, “I have not applied for pardon”?

He not only applied for one, he also sought more: more time before giving himself up, and worse, not to surrender before the TADA court authorities in Mumbai but before their counterparts in the Pune jail. And, pray, why? He claimed that his life and those of his family members were at risk if he surrendered before the Mumbai court. That’s not funny, it’s downright laughable — pitiful, pathetic, even embarrassing. In Bollywood imagery, a man trying desperately to cling on to anything to defer or stall the inevitable.

No honour, no pride. Like an inebriated Circuit telling Munnabhai, “Bhai, agar main hal chalaega toh bayl kya karega? (what will the bull do if I draw the plough). For now, the joke’s on Munnabhai, sorry Sanjay Dutt.