Gautam Chintamani

In the early 1980s, when a very famous and critically acclaimed Hindi film actor watched Purush (the Marathi play that turned Nana Patekar into the talk of the town) he went up to Patekar and asked him "How do you do it, Nana? How?" Patekar would light up the stage with his matchless passion and intensity every single night. When Ankush arrived in 1986, the whole country witnessed what only patrons of Marathi theatre had experienced until then. It would be an understatement to call Patekar's performance electric. There was a certain authenticity to his intensity which amplified its impact, even on screen, away from the stage. His intensity felt authentic because it was inherent, a part of him, a part of everything he did. When he made his directorial debut with Prahaar (1991), he carried over that intensity, deciding to actually train for three years with the Maratha Light Infantry before playing an Army Major in the film. His body of work, spanning five decades, cements his legacy as one of our finest actors but his philanthropy, particularly over the last decade and a half needs to be appreciated as well. For more than a decade now, he was essentially pledging almost all of his earnings to farmers' relief in some shape or form. Goodbye, Nana Kaka. Thank you for the movies and thank you for consistently helping our farmers. Godspeed.