New Delhi. Today is the birthday of actor Manoj Bajpayee, who is known for his brilliant acting in Bollywood. He was born on 23 April 1969 in ‘Narkatiyaganj’ of Bihar. He completed his early education from Raja High School, Bettiah District. He completed his further studies from Satyavati College and did his graduation from Ramjas College, University of Delhi. After being rejected from the National School of Drama three times, he did theater with Barry John from the Barry Drama School. After being a part of theater here for several days, Manoj struggled to make his mark on the big screen. In the early days of his career, he had to face many rejections. But he did not give up and one day he got a chance to act in Mahesh Bhatt’s serial Swabhimaan. Manoj’s stellar performance in this serial aired on Doordarshan was noticed by everyone and due to this he got a chance to act in Shekhar Kapur’s film ‘Bandit Queen’ released in 1994. Although his role in this film was small, yet he got a lot of notice. After this he got many roles, but he got his real identity from Ram Gopal Varma’s film ‘Satya’ in the year 1998. He was also awarded the ‘National Award’ for his performance in this film.
Talking about Manoj Bajpayee’s personal life, he married actress Shabana Raza after dating her for almost seven years. Shabana Raza changed her name from Shabana to ‘Neha’ before joining films. Both of them also have a daughter, whose name is ‘Avanayala’. During an interview, he told that there was a time in his life when he started thinking of committing suicide. His financial condition was so bad that at that time he found Vada Pav too expensive. He further told that ‘at that time his friends slept together and did not leave him alone even for a minute. His friends did not leave Manoj Bajpayee’s side till he made his mark in Bollywood. Apart from this, one of his anecdotes with Pankaj Tripathi is also very famous.
On the show of ‘The Kapil Sharma Show’, Pankaj Tripathi had told that ‘before acting, he used to work in a hotel. Once Manoj reached the hotel as a guest, where he accidentally left his slippers. After this the hoteliers decided that they would keep this slipper with them and when Manoj comes again, they will return it to him. Pankaj Tripathi was a big fan of Manoj Bajpayee. He requested the hotel management to give them these slippers. Pankaj kept these slippers from the Lost and Found department with him forever as a blessing to Manoj.