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At 27, Ronit Roy had an amazing start as an actor in the Hindi film industry. He debuted with the 1992 film Jaan Tere Naam, which was a commercial success. In 1993, he starred alongside Aditya Pancholi and Kishori Shahane in Bomb Blast, which too worked well at the box office. However, despite the success of his films, the actor failed to receive more work. Having seen success at the very beginning of his career, and still not getting any job made no sense to the actor, who eventually got carried away by alcoholism and had no money to buy food.
In a recent conversation with Podcast Redcarpet, Ronit Roy recalled that terrible phase of his life that forced him to start a security agency, which today provides security to many A-listers of Bollywood. The actor recalled the agency was a product of desperation and not diversification.
Recalling the time, the actor said, “I am a honest kind of guy, I can only tell you the way it was. It was (the result of) hunger, poverty.” He further explained his statement and said, “Every great step that I have taken in my life has come out of desperation, frustration, and poverty. There was a time when my debut film was a silver jubilee, and after that I didn’t get any work. I have no idea why. I got frustrated. Silver Jubilee in today’s time is equal to delivering a Rs 100 to 150 crore film. How can you deliver a film like that and still not get work? I got no work. I got so scared. I had rent to pay, had to feed myself. What would you do without money? So I kind of signed the wrong films, which flopped. I went back to square one and had no work.”
“My alcoholism started out of that frustration. After that everything went south. My life went into gutter.” Ronit shared that even though he struggled to buy food for himself, he would never be short on alcohol. “Somehow the alcohol would come. I cannot think where the alcohol came from”, he said.
His alcoholism took a toll on his lifestyle. Ronit shared, “I would wake up at noon and then have hangover, it only made things worse. I was written off by the industry, they said he is finished.” It was around this time that a friend of the actor suggested him to use his name as a brand and start a business. “He said, though I am not getting any acting job, my name and face still holds value. He had a security agency, I used to go to his office to get trained and that’s where it started from. It was a result of desperation.”
After receiving no work from Bollywood, Ronit Roy turned to television. “People wrote ‘I made a shift to television’, but it was not shift, it was just a matter of survival”, shared the Adaalat actor. Fortunately, things worked for the actor in television, he became a hit among the audience with shows like Kasauti Zindagi Kay, and Bandini. Ronit, eventually became one of the highest-paid television stars. The success also helped him cut alcohol and bring his life back on track. “The alcohol stopped. Attention, and discipline returned. Roles worked”, shared Ronit Roy.
After a successful run on television, Bollywood once again approached him. He then featured in supporting roles in films like 2 states, Student of the Year, Shootout At Wadala, The Girl In Yellow Boots, and Ugly, among others. He also marked his Telugu debut with Jr NTR’s film Jai Lava Kusa.
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