Vijay Deverakonda turns a year older  

When I saw Vijay Deverakonda in the Telugu film Arjun Reddy I knew I was looking at a very special actor. Vijay was fresh original and angry. He was a rebel. I don’t know about the cause.  But there was definitely a lot of applause, and the brickbats too. A noisy section of the audience found Arjun Reddy misogynistic and toxic, which he was; but when did Vijay deny it? “But isn’t cinema supposed to show us the mirror of social reality, and doesn’t the mirror also show us the ugly side of life? As an actor who likes challenges, I’d like to explore the dark side of human behaviour,” Vijay argued angrily. Arjun Reddy exhausted Vijay. He had to be constantly probing into the darkest areas of his consciousness, digging out feelings and tapping into emotions he had never touched within himself. Unlike Arjun, Vijay is not demonstrative about his feelings. In fact, Arjun has kept it all locked up within myself all his life. That’s why Arjun Reddy was very hard for Vijay. The character was constantly deep-diving into grey and dark areas of his subconscious. Left to himself Vijay would have never gone there. Arjun Reddy was shades darker than anything we had seen in Indian cinema. It shook not only Telugu cinema, it also made Bollywood a little insecure about the future of screen heroism. Looking back Vijay admits Arjun was a scumbag who treated his loved ones with scant respect. “And he needed to slapped hard. Arjun was not a role model, who said he was? I didn’t! We knew we were doing something never done before, at least not in Telugu cinema. We were sure we’d make some kind of an impact. It went much further than we expected.” After Arjun Reddy,Vijay politely refused to do the Hindi remake. He had done that, been there. Vijay wanted to explore other characters, play people who are less socially unacceptable than Arjun Reddy. When I saw Vijay in Dear Comrade, I thought he was still very angry; this time about sexual harassment of women at the work place. “And why just women, men get bullied and harassed too. Almost all my female friends have at one time or the other been pinched, groped or at least touched inappropriately. This makes me very angry. Why can’t we create a healthy friendly comfortable work-atmosphere for women and yes, men too?” Vijay raised a pertinent point. Here was an actor who wasn’t in this for the money and fame alone. Vijay wanted to make a difference. His fan following was swelling  in waves during hightide. Girls swooned over him. The guys wanted to dress like him. And the kids loved him the most. Vijay’s fans are called ‘rowdies’ affectionately. He loves them, gifts them with tokens of his appreciation. I remember for one birthday Vijay was on the streets distributing free ice cream to underprivileged kids. Whatever he did made news. Through the superstardom that hit him with meteoric celerity Vijay remained unchanged; at least he was and he still remains the same with me. Unlike some actor who change every Friday, this guy is rock-solid in his allegiances and belief. In 2018 when he had three releases, I asked Vijay if that was not one too many. He told me it was okay to not have releases when they were not worth it. Clearly this was a success story that could not be contained in the Telugu film industry alone.  It was time for Vijay to fly. And what better pilot than Karan Johar? Karan saw Vijay in Dear Comrade. He bought the Hindi rights of the film. And planned to launch Vijay as the biggest star since Shah Rukh Khan.But Vijay preferred something original in Hindi. That’s how Liger was born. As it approaches release Vijay feels progressively confident about his Hindi debut. “Making a mark in any language is fine.The important thing is  to do the work that you believe in,” says Vijay.   Subhash K Jha is a Patna-based film critic who has been writing about Bollywood for long enough to know the industry inside out. He tweets at @SubhashK_Jha. Read all the  Latest News ,  Trending News ,  Cricket News ,  Bollywood News ,  India News  and  Entertainment News  here. Follow us on  Facebook ,  Twitter  and  Instagram .