Singh Is The New King

He Is Fast Turning Into The New Hit Machine And Is The First Choice For Endorsements For A Variety Of Mega Brands. Ranveer Singh Is An Idea Whose Time Has Come.

- Sourav Majumdar

IT’S 6 P.M. ON A LAZY SATURDAY EVENING. The narrow lane next to St. Andrew’s Church in Bandra comes alive with a flash crowd thronging the streets, bringing traffic to a standstill. People jostle with each other and whip out their smartphones with camera apps on standby. As anticipation runs high, a tall, bearded man emerges from a small house, smiling, waving and gesturing at the crowd animatedly.

The folks on the street have just caught a glimpse of Ranveer Singh, 33, Bollywood’s newest and arguably 2018’s biggest superstar. Singh is dubbing for one of his upcoming films, Gully Boy, at Purple Haze Studios in Bandra and is getting ready to head home. Wearing his trademark oversized Carrera sunglasses and clad in an orange sweatshirt, black track pants, and white sneakers—all made by Adidas, one of 26 brands he endorses—Singh mounts a portable Marshall speaker on his shoulder and dances his way to his ride waiting close by. The speaker, blaring at full volume, is playing Singh’s latest rendition of a hip-hop number from his upcoming film, in which he plays an aspiring rapper from Mumbai’s slums looking to break the class divide and make it big.

As he dances to the tune of his own song, Singh makes his way to his car, a matte black Mercedes GLS AMG sports utility vehicle. All this while, the fans and paparazzi in his way keep rapturously chanting: “Baba! Baba! Apna time aayega, Baba!” Baba is a nickname that has stuck with Singh after some of his close friends in Bollywood started calling him that. Apna time aayega (‘our time will come’ in Hindi) is a line from one of his songs in Gully Boy, which is already topping the charts. The adulation bears testimony to the fact that Singh’s time has indeed come in a country where cinema and cricket icons are worshipped as demigods.