New Delhi: Popular television game show ‘Kaun Banega Crorepati’, commonly known as the KBC, is all set to return on Monday, a day ahead of Independence Day. Season 15 of the reality game show KBC will premier at 9 pm on Sony Entertainment Television with megastar Amitabh Bachchan as its host.
With the KBC fever set to grip the country, here’s a look at one of its contestants, who became a crorepati overnight but was later hooked to alcohol and saw his life falling apart.
Sushil Kumar, the first Rs 5 crore winner of KBC
Sushil Kumar hogged the limelight when he became the first Rs 5 crore winner of the ‘Kaun Banega Crorepati’. He bagged the jackpot in 2011, out of which he received Rs 3.6 crore after tax deduction.
Sushil, who hails from Bihar, however, opened up in 2020 and said that the 2015-16 period was the ‘most challenging time’ for him and that he had no idea about what to do in his life.
He had reportedly left his job after winning the massive sum as had his other brothers.
In a long Facebook post in September 2020, Sushil had expressed that it was better to be a good person rather than being a famous one.
“Due to being a local celebrity, I used to attend functions across Bihar for 10-15 days in a month, and these kept me away from studies,” he said in a long motivational post.
KBC crorepati Sushil Kumar currently working as social worker
Sushil Kumar is currently working as an environmental activist and social worker. Before grabbing the headlines in 2011, he was working as a computer operator and was a tutor by profession.
In his Facebook post in 2020, he had penned down that he was very serious about the media at that time and whenever the reporters asked him about his profession, he used to tell them that he was doing business in order to let them know that he’s not ‘useless’.
He said that those businesses eventually used to fail after a few days.
“After KBC, I used to donate a lot which was mostly undisclosed donations and around Rs 50 thousand was spent in a month in such donations,” he said.
“Due to this, few clever people started connecting with me and I was also cheated a lot of time, that I realised after a long time,” the KBC winner added.
केबीसी जितने के बाद का मेरे जीवन का सबसे बुरा समय ——————————————————— 2015-2016…
Posted by Mantu Kumar Sushil on Saturday, 12 September 2020
Sushil also opened up on his deteriorating relationship with his wife and his time in Delhi with media students of Jamia Millia Islamia, the Indian Institute of Mass Communication (IIMC) and researchers from the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU).
Sushil said that his wife often used to say that you do not recognize the right and wrong people and that you do not worry about the future.
“After hearing all these things, I used to think that she is not able to understand me, and then there used to be a lot of fights between us,” he had written in his Facebook post.
Sushil expressed that there were also some good things happening at the same time as in the national capital, he had started a cab business with a friend, due to which he had to visit Delhi almost every month for a few days.
“I was introduced to some media students in Jamia Millia. Then I was introduced to students of IIMC, then their seniors, then the students doing research at JNU, and some theatre artists etc. When these people used to talk about a topic, it seemed like that ‘I am a frog in the well’ who knows nothing about so many things,” Sushil wrote.
He also stated that with these things, he also got addicted to smoking and drinking.
“Whenever I used to sit with these people, alcohol and cigarettes were always there.”
“At one time, if I stayed for seven days, then it would have been different sittings with seven such groups for seven days,” said Sushil.
Sushil also talked about how he loved cinema and how he had left his home to settle in Mumbai to become a movie director.
“I watched a lot of cinema, saw almost every National Award-winning film, Oscar-winning film, Ritwik Ghatak and Satyajit Ray’s movies, and had a dream of becoming a film director,” he said.
“When I spoke to a producer friend, he asked me about some technical things related to the film, which I could not tell, then he suggested me to work with a TV serial for a few days and later he will get me placed with a film director.
“Then I worked with a big production house and got a chance to understand the story, screenplay, dialogue copy, props costume, but after a while, my mind started getting restless,” Sushil said.
He said that he had come to Mumbai and had dreamt of becoming a film director but left the dream and stayed in a friend’s room where he spent all day watching movies and reading books that he bought from the Delhi Book Fair for six months.
“I used to finish a cigarette packet in a day… Living alone all day and reading and writing gave me an opportunity to look inside myself and realise that I did not come to Mumbai to become a director, instead, I’m someone who is running away from the truth,” Sushil said adding that the real happiness is doing what one desire and that the pride can never be pacified.
“Happiness is hidden in small-small things,” he shared.
“I think that the needs of life should be kept as low as possible, and we should only earn to get those fulfilled,” Sushil opined.
