Ameya Hunaswadkar

QAMYAB – THE FORGOTTEN GEMS OF BOLLYWOOD

Qamyab is our humble tribute to all those lesser-known actors, one hit wonders and junior artists who we see umpteen times but don’t know about; beyond their faces. These actors have been an integral part of Bollywood but didn’t get their due. This series is our sincere attempt to put a name to these faces, familiarize them to our readers and celebrate their achievements in life – however big or small. We believe that every artist contributes in his/her own way to the cinema’s success. Qamyab will explore the unknown lives of such actors and artists as we believe even these forgotten gems of Bollywood deserve their due recognition today.

Since the golden era of Hindi cinema, there have been many actors who got recognition not only for talent but also due to their obese persona. These actors were mostly cast in comic roles and their fat body provided the humour quotient for the audience. A few names in this mould include Tuntun, Gope, Moolchand, Ramavtaar, Polson, Preeti Ganguly, Guddi Maruti, Nilofer and the more recent Bharti Singh.

Our actor for this week is talented as well as obese like the above lot. He has appeared in a few Hindi films but contributed significantly to Marathi cinema as well as the advertising world. His name is Ameya Hunaswadkar, better known as the ‘Baba Lagin’ guy from the Marathi hit Pachhadlela (2004).

Ameya was born on 8th August, 1982 in a middle-class Maharashtrian family in Kolhapur but is a total Mumbaikar having spent most of his childhood and younger days in the city’s Prabhadevi area. He completed his tenth class from IES Modern English School, Dadar West. After completing school, Ameya told his parents that he wanted to be an actor and was not interested in studying anymore. His parents weren’t in favour of this decision as they considered acting to be a profession of rich and high-class people only.

Nevertheless, Ameya was adamant to take up acting and hence, sought guidance from his neighbour who was none other than the legend of Hindi and Marathi cinema late Sulochana Didi (Sulochana Latkar). She was very fond of Ameya and introduced him to everyone as her grandson.

Ameya started his career in 1999 at a young age of seventeen years with the TV serial Zindaginama which had Seema Kapoor in the lead. He also started doing ad films while struggling hard to find work. His first notable commercial was in 2000 with then fresh stars Hrithik Roshan and Ameesha Patel, right after their blockbuster release Kaho Naa..Pyaar Hai.

In the following year, Ameya made his Hindi film debut with Nayak (2001), which had Anil Kapoor in the central role of a ‘ek din ka chief minister’. Ameya had just a blink and miss role in this movie as a college kid in the crowd supporting the fellow student pushed out of BEST bus during the riots’ scene.

In the coming years, Ameya was mostly seen in ad films and did one TV serial called Aap Beti which was a popular horror serial on Doordarshan until 2004.

His big break came in the form of Tujhe Meri Kasam (2003) which was the Bollywood debut of Riteish Deshmukh and Genelia D’Souza. Ameya played Riteish Deshmukh’s best friend in this film which was a modest success at the box office and Ameya got noticed in his pivotal albeit small role.

During one of her birthday celebrations, Sulochana Didi introduced Ameya to the popular actor- director of Marathi cinema, Mahesh Kothare who had given multiple hits with superstar Laxmikant Berde. Sulochana Didi’s word was enough for Kothare to sign Ameya for his next movie Pachhadlela (2004). The film had a stellar cast including Kothare’s favourite Laxmikant Berde along with Dilip Prabhavalkar, Bharat Jadhav, Vijay Chavan and Shreyas Talpade.

Compared to these big names, Ameya was just a newcomer but when he came on the screen, it left a mighty impression on the audience. Ameya played the obese and mentally challenged son of Dilip Prabhavalkar who is obsessed with getting married. Later, his character is killed and turns in to a ghost but still, remains hilarious.

One of Ameya’s punchline in Pachhadlela was ‘Baba Lagin (dhin chak, dhin chak)’. This particular line became such a rage that for years, people remembered and referred to him as Baba Lagin. Pachhadlela became a huge hit and gave tremendous recognition to Ameya. A few months after the film’s release, there was a DJ remix song created on this dialogue as ‘Baba Lagin (dhin chak dhin chak)’.

Pachhadlela’s success opened the doors for Ameya in Marathi as well as Hindi films and he went on to appear in some big movies with top stars. These films were Plan (2004), Khabardar (2004), Chatur Navra Chikni Baiko (2005), Aksar (2006), Rocky (2006), Victoria No. 203 (2007), Bombay To Bangkok (2008), Full 2 Dhamaal (2008), Hridaynath (2012), Zapatlela 2 (2013) and many more.

A Marathi movie titled Baba Lagin (2007), named after Ameya’s iconic character from Pachhadlela, had him in a pivotal role. One of his best roles in Hindi cinema remains Ajab Prem Ki Ghazab Kahani (2009) where he played Ranbir Kapoor’s friend.

The role came his way by chance when during a visit to a well-known studio, Ameya found that noted director Raj Kumar Santoshi was looking out for a fat guy to play an important character in his upcoming film. Ameya decided to audition for the same and instantly got selected. Who can forget his funny character in Ajab Prem Ki Ghazab Kahani where he sleeps in a coffin and dresses up as a nun and a begum to help his dear friend Ranbir.

Ameya also got a chance to share screen space with the ever gorgeous Madhuri Dixit in her Marathi debut Bucket List (2018) in which he played a comical hawaldar who comes to arrest her drunken character in a pub.

All this while, Ameya’s career was progressing fairly well and he was seen in many Marathi as well as Hindi movies. He was simultaneously doing commercials with superstars like Amitabh Bachchan, Salman Khan, Aamir Khan, Kareena Kapoor, etc. Till date, he has done close to a hundred and fifty ads.

In his two decades career, Ameya has worked with all the big names in Hindi and Marathi Cinema like Laxmikant Berde, Ashok Saraf, Ranbir Kapoor, Madhuri Dixit, Bharat Jadhav, Shreyas Talpade, Aditya Panscholi, Mahesh Kothare, Satish Kaushik and Jackie Shroff (who still calls him grandson of the late Sulochana Didi).

Unfortunately at the upswing of his career, a tragedy struck Ameya when his mother suddenly fell sick and was bed-ridden for a long time. During this testing time, Ameya chose to be beside her and took care of everything. As he needed to tend to his ailing mother, Ameya took a sabbatical from work and thus, lost out on many offers. He was out of work for close to nine years. During this period, rumours started spreading in the Marathi film world that Ameya was not working as he had fallen prey to drug addiction but nobody bothered to find the truth about his mother’s illness.

Due to lack of income, Ameya fell short of finance for his mother’s treatment and had to sell his house in Prabhadevi and shifted to the suburban Kandivali in Mumbai. After his mother’s demise, he decided to get back to work and recently appeared in the Hindi film Chhatriwali (2023) with Rakul Preet Singh in the titular role. Ameya was seen as her colleague who works in a condom manufacturing company run by the late Satish Kaushik. Ameya’s character had grey shades as he is shown jealous of Rakul Preet’s character. Chhatriwali didn’t get a theatrical release and streamed directly on the OTT app Zee 5. Ameya’s role ended up heavily edited in the final cut but still, received appreciation.

Tragically, Ameya faced a health scare after Chhatriwali’s release and thankfully, his good friends Shyam Mashalkar and Akul Tripathi stood by him for which, he is indebted to them.

Even as Ameya is on the road to recovery, he is also getting ready to get back to his first love which is acting. We wish him all the best and sincerely hope he gets another Pachhadlela and Ajab Prem Ki Ghazab Kahani soon!!