Sushant Singh Rajput: The man who was more than an actor

The dearly departed star’s fascination with science and outer space is a much talked-about subject currently

Indians are still not over the death of Bollywood star Sushant Singh Rajput. While media and politics have weaseled their way into it and is now making it a mess, let’s talk about the late star’s passions other than cinema.

Unlike most B-town stars, Sushant Singh Rajput had a deep interest for science, or to put more specifically, astrophysics. Even his Instagram and Twitter bios read, “Photon double-slit,” referencing the famous double-slit experiment conducted by Thomas Young which showed that light can behave as a wave or as particles.

Love for the unknown

Sujit Jaiswal/AFP

In a report by HT quotes in 2017, the actor was quoted saying that he always had a fascination with outer space, and as a child, he was interested in stars, galaxies and constellations. He always wondered what life in outer space would be like, and when he offered the film Chanda Mama Door Ke, he accepted immediately.

In order to prepare for his role, he even went to NASA, and had special effect supervisor John Palmer, who had done movies such as Appollo 13, Deep Impact, Armageddon, and The Martian help with his training and also made a space suit for him. He also got a chance to interact with real-life astronauts to understand how life was inside a spaceship. He also actively followed the 2019 Chandrayaan-2 moon mission, and shared most of its details on social media.

Aside from astrophysics, Sushant also learnt coding during the lockdown period, as he had an interest in gaming.

He applied this same passion in his movies as well, which includes Chhichhore, Kai Po Che, MS Dhobi: The Untold Story among other hits.

 

(Cover: Getty)