Ravi Baswani at 80: The Actor Who Made Us Laugh, and the Film He Never Got to Make!

Remembering the man behind Chashme Buddoor and Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro through the stories he told about himself.

When I think of Ravi Baswani, I think first of that wonderfully natural presence on screen. In Chashme Buddoor, he could make an ordinary conversation funny without appearing to work for the laugh. In Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro, he helped carry one of Hindi cinema’s most enduring comedies.


Ravi Baswani (As Sudhir in JBDY)

His performance in Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro won him the Filmfare Award for Best Comedian (1985) - recognition for the comic timing that made Sudhir unforgettable.

Today, 29th Sep, on what would have been his 80th birthday, I wanted to look beyond those two films. The Ravi Baswani I found in his own account of his life is even more interesting: a child drawn to the stage, a young man who walked away from a secure job, and an actor who spent years resisting the idea that comedy was all he could do.

The boy who loved the stage

Baswani wrote that he was born on 29 September 1946 in Bulandshahr, Uttar Pradesh, although his school records gave a different date. His lasting memories of home were of Connaught Circus in Delhi, where family, school friends and college friends continued to gather over the years.

He recalled acting from the age of six. Plays remained part of his life through school and college, and at Delhi University he won a best actor award. Yet he did not initially plan a career in films or theatre.

There is a small detail here that feels wonderfully human. Baswani attended Kirori Mal College, but in his own account he said that an attendance problem meant he eventually graduated from Meerut College. Several short biographies flatten that story into “graduated from Kirori Mal College.” His version is more memorable, and perhaps more fitting for a man who preferred to tell a story his own way.

A play that changed his direction

After college, Baswani took a job in marketing. Then he saw a production of Badal Sircar’s Evam Indrajit.

Its image of a man trapped in an endless, repetitive struggle struck him personally. Baswani later described coming away from the play and recognising something of his own working life in it. He left his corporate job and committed himself to theatre.

It was hardly the obvious route to security. Theatre paid little, so he worked not only as an actor but also in direction and design. With others in Delhi, he formed Non-Group, a theatre collective whose name was itself a response to the divisions he saw among established groups.

That is the part of his story I find especially appealing. Before the films and the familiar face on screen, there was someone building a working life in theatre because he could no longer ignore what he loved doing.

How Sparsh led to Chashme Buddoor

Baswani’s route into cinema was equally unconventional. When Naseeruddin Shah brought the script of Sai Paranjpye’s Sparsh to Delhi, Baswani became involved behind the scenes, handling props.

He later joked on his website that his role in Paranjpye’s Chashme Buddoor might have been a reward for his work on Sparsh. Paranjpye remembered something more substantial: she had seen his theatre work and recognised his ability as an actor.

And so audiences met him as Jai in Chashme Buddoor. Two years later came Sudhir, the photographer he played opposite Naseeruddin Shah in Kundan Shah’s Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro.

Those performances gave him a lasting place in the audience’s affection. They also brought a label he did not particularly welcome: comedian. Baswani believed his theatre experience had prepared him for a wider range of roles.

The teacher at FTII

There is another chapter of his career that deserves more attention.

When the Film and Television Institute of India in Pune revived its acting course in 2004, Baswani took charge of it as course director. Naseeruddin Shah contributed to the programme’s design. Baswani was there to help train a new generation of actors, drawing on the years he had spent learning his craft on stage and on screen.

So his FTII story is not one of youthful student days in Pune. It is the story of an experienced actor returning to the classroom as a teacher.

A contemporary report described his ambition for the students simply: to prepare professionals, rather than manufacture stars.

The unfinished film and the road from Nainital

In his final years, Baswani was working towards directing a feature film. In one of his last interviews, he described a story centred on a ten-year-old orphan, his grandmother and a small, isolated world in the hills. He spoke of wanting to make a film with innocence at its heart, one that could speak to adults as well as children.

In July 2010, he travelled to the Nainital area to look for locations. On his way back towards Delhi, he suffered a fatal heart attack in Haldwani on 27 July. The film remained unmade.

This detail stopped me when I read it. Haldwani sits in the Nainital district, a landscape that carries another meaning for me because of Neem Karoli Baba and Kainchi Dham. I am not suggesting that Baswani had a connection with Maharaj-ji; I found no evidence of one. It is simply a place I know through a different story, unexpectedly appearing at the end of his.

And the greater sadness is that he was there for a creative reason. He was still searching for the setting of a film he cared about making.

Remembering the whole artist

It would be easy to remember Ravi Baswani through two beloved comedies alone. They are reason enough to celebrate him. But his own account reveals a fuller life: the child actor, the Delhi theatre worker, the man who gave up a secure career, the resourceful colleague behind Sparsh, the FTII teacher, and the would-be filmmaker still pursuing a long-held ambition.

Perhaps that is the birthday tribute he deserves. Not just a replay of the scenes that made us laugh, but a moment to remember the artist who kept working, teaching, writing and imagining what he might make next.

Happy birthday, Ravi Baswani. Your film in the hills never reached the screen, but the joy you gave us certainly did.

—Ash

Sources and further reading

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