Returning to his city Chandigarh after three years for a shoot, coinciding with his birthday, Sahil Khattar, actor and youtuber who shot to limelight after he essayed Syed Kirmani in 83’, shattered all restrictions of his strict diet he has been on lately. “I had not eaten roti for 25 days in preparation for an upcoming role. But I am in Chandigarh, how can I not eat roti? And I am a vegetarian at that,” he said in his usual wit.
Commenting his recent beefing up, he said while he is ecstatic at social media comments turning from “nice” to “hot” on his pictures, his backstory was not as encouraging. “I was very puny and not good looking as a kid and never identified as my parents’ son,” he laughs, adding, “Then I went bald at 21 and hit a low point also because of some other issues. I never got any attention from girls and was never the popular guy in college and roamed around like a guy with an inferiority complex that makes him confront others just to show a false superiority. That’s when my dad told me, ‘when you are going through something that you feel is a liability, think of it as an asset’. And I made my baldness as a template and stood out because I looked different. Because I am owning all what has been done to me in childhood, I can say proudly that life has changed.”
Commenting his recent beefing up, he said while he is ecstatic at social media comments turning from “nice” to “hot” on his pictures, his backstory was not as encouraging. “I was very puny and not good looking as a kid and never identified as my parents’ son,” he laughs, adding, “Then I went bald at 21 and hit a low point also because of some other issues. I never got any attention from girls and was never the popular guy in college and roamed around like a guy with an inferiority complex that makes him confront others just to show a false superiority. That’s when my dad told me, ‘when you are going through something that you feel is a liability, think of it as an asset’. And I made my baldness as a template and stood out because I looked different. Because I am owning all what has been done to me in childhood, I can say proudly that life has changed.”
However, gaining muscle wasn’t a task for him owing to his athletic background. “I used to play roller hockey and won a bronze medal in Asian games, so athletics comes naturally to me. I was doing 200 squats a day when I essayed Syed Kirmani in 83’ and I wonder if after Jennifer Lopez a butt needed insurance, that should have been mine!”
From losing the “dad bod that I had gained in two years of the pandemic”, to undergoing body transformation, Sahil says, “A role can drive me crazy for his prep. But eventually, I feel it was worth it in moments like the applause I received on the dialogue in 83’ when I tell Kapil Dev ‘tu mar mein khada hun na’. And all that humiliation for being bald, puny or dark in childhood, stands redeemed.”
