“I could also sense Rakeysh’s palpable excitement for the film and knew that he would be passionately involved in the project,” said Akhtar.įarhan Akhtar, who won best actor for the movie, was also a natural fit to play the role, having been a runner at school himself. I was moved by it and also inspired at the same time and I felt it was a story that needed to be told,” Farhan Akhtar, who plays Milkha Singh in the film, told. “The story itself was an incredible journey. The fascinating story was one of the primary reasons for it. However, in 2013, it was a fairly novel concept and the success of ‘Bhaag Milkha Bhaag’ set the tone for biopics. A gripping human storyīiopics may be the rage in Bollywood now, with several stars like London 2012 bronze-medallist MC Mary Kom, and former Indian cricket team captains Mohammad Azharuddin and MS Dhoni having had movies based on their lives. The movie is based on Milkha Singh’s autobiography, ‘The Race of my Life’.

The Bhaag Milkha Bhaag cast also includes Yograj Singh, father of former Indian cricketer Yuvraj Singh. The Bollywood biopic, one of the highest-grossing films at the box office that year, also starred Sonam Kapoor, Divya Dutta and Pavan Malhotra as some of the integral characters in the life of the Indian athlete. It’s why the story of Milkha Singh’s life was brought forth in the 2013 Bollywood biopic, Bhaag Milkha Bhaag.ĭirected by Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra and starring Farhan Akhtar in the lead role, the Milkha Singh movie traced the journey of the champion runner from a 12-year-old escaping the horrors of partition to the star athlete he eventually became. However, not many knew much about him beyond that race. His fourth-place finish in the 400m broke the national record and made him one of Indian sport’s early heroes. Everyone in India knows Milkha Singh as the man who came the closest to touching history at the Rome 1960 Olympics.

Director of bhaag milkha bhaag