Shatrughan Sinha (English: Shatrughan Sinha, born 9 December, 1945, Patna, Bihar) is a famous film actor and politician. People know famous Hindi film actor Shatrughan Sinha by the name of ‘Bihari Babu’. Shatrughan Sinha was born on December 9, 1945 in Patna, the capital of Bihar. Father was Bhuvaneshwari Prasad Sinha and mother was Shyama Devi. Shatru’s father was a doctor by profession, that is why he wanted his son Shatru to also become a doctor. But this was not acceptable to Shotgun. Shatrughan Sinha, the youngest among his four brothers, was called Chhotka Babua by everyone in the house. Shatrughan is a graduate from the Film and Television Institute of India, Pune.
Shatrughan Sinha had a desire to work in films since childhood. Ignoring his father’s wishes, he took admission in the Film and Television Institute of Pune. After taking training from there, he started trying in films. But due to cleft lip, luck was not on his side. In such a situation, he started thinking of getting plastic surgery done. Then Devanand refused to do so. He started his career with the film ‘Saajan’ in the year 1969. In the fifties-sixties, K.N. Singh, Pran, Amjad Khan and Amrish Puri in the sixties and seventies. And parallel to this, Bihari Babu alias Shotgun alias Shatrughan Sinha, trained in acting from the Film and TV Institute, enters Hindi cinema. This was the period when multi-starrer films were making money at the box office.
Shatrughan soon became the audience’s favorite due to his booming, strong voice and intoxicating style of movement. When he came, he wanted to be a hero, but the industry made him a villain. After leaving his mark as a villain, he also became a hero. Like Johnny aka Rajkumar, Shatrughan’s dialogue delivery has been of a blunt style. This was the reason why he was declared a ‘talkative actor’. The words coming out of his mouth were like the bullets of a gun, hence he was also given the title of ‘Shotgun’. After Shatrughan’s first Hindi film ‘Saajan’ (1968) directed by director Mohan Sehgal, he got Chander Vohra’s film ‘Khilona’ (1970) on the recommendation of actress Mumtaz. Its hero was Sanjeev Kumar. Bihari Babu was given the role of Bihari Dalla. Shatrughan played it so well that overnight he became the first choice of the producers. There is a long cut mark on one cheek of his face. This mark became the plus point of his villainy. Shatrughan has made effective use of this ‘cut’ in his facial expressions.
Many of Shatrughan’s films started releasing one after the other with Amitabh Bachchan, the angry young man of that era. In 1979, the ambitious film ‘Kala Patthar’ directed by Yash Chopra was released. Its hero was Amitabh. The film was based on the true incident of flooding of coal mine Chasnala in Bihar in 1975 and the rescue of hundreds of workers. In this film, Shatrughan played the role of a criminal named Mangal Singh. There was a face-to-face clash between these two maestros in this film. Kaala Patthar did not work but the audience liked the Amitabh-Shatrava clash very much. Later, Amitabh-Shatrughan came together in films like Dostana (directed by Raj Khosla), Shaan (directed by Ramesh Sippy) and Naseeb (directed by Manmohan Desai).
Shatrughan Sinha has worked in at least 200 Hindi films in almost four decades. Sinha became known for his negative characters in films. Her famous films include ‘Rampur Ka Laxman’, ‘Kalicharan’, films with Millennium Star Amitabh Bachchan include ‘Dostana’, ‘Kala Patthar’, ‘Shaan’ and ‘Naseeb’ etc. Films ‘Kranti’ (1981-Manoj Kumar), Waqt Ki Deewar (1981-Ravi Tandon), Naram-Garam (1981-Hrishikesh Mukherjee), Qayamat (1983-Raj Sippy), Chor Police (1983-Amjad Khan), Maati Maange Suffice it to mention Khoon (1984-Raj Khosla) and Khudgarj (1987- Rakesh Roshan). He has also acted in the Punjabi films ‘Putt Jattaan De’ and ‘Sat Shri Akal’. Apart from acting, he also tried his hand at singing in films like ‘Kashmakash’, ‘Dost’ and ‘Do Nari’. In the recently released Ram Gopal Varma’s film ‘Raktacharita’, he played the role of former Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N. Played the role of T. Rama Rao for which he got his mustache shaved for the first time.
Shatrughan Sinha is the first leader from Bollywood who was made a Union Cabinet Minister in the government of Atal Bihari Vajpayee. At present he is a Lok Sabha member from Patna Sahib parliamentary constituency of Bihar. Shatrughan Sinha’s daughter Sonakshi Sinha started her film career by working with famous actor Salman Khan in the most successful film of the year 2010 ‘Dabangg’.
