When even character roles like in Naya Daur and Mughal-e-Azam grew thin on the ground, Ajit switched to villainy with Sooraj (1966). However, his straight-laced portrayals won little acclaim till Zanjeer (1973) saw the birth of a new persona. Director Prakash Mehra reveals that this transition was not exactly accidental. "Ajit felt that the villains of Hindi films shout a great deal; so he created a soft-spoken villain. He said he had observed that underworld kingpins often spoke with a great deal of humility. With Zanjeer, Ajit revolutionised the way villains spoke." In a scene from Zanjeer, when a high-strung Amitabh accosts Ajit with, "Teja, main jail se bahar aa gaya hoon", a cool Ajit parries with, "Kaho toh phir andar karva doon?" Ajit projected a casual calm that was unnerving in its implicit danger. However, it wasn't his golden brown hair or the smart array of bathrobes but his store of quotable quips ("Mona darling", "smart boy") peppered throughout the film and delivered in his archetypal style that set the tone for the Ajit persona of several seventies films.