Shashank Arora, bhai to Bollywood's bhai, Salman Khan, on building a rapport with actor during Bharat shoot
Sonil Dedhia (MID-DAY; April 12, 2019)

As it would have been with his contemporaries as well, Shashank Arora did not ask for any other detail when Ali Abbas Zafar approached him for the role of Salman Khan's brother. "I didn't have any knowledge about the film, and only learnt, when things were finalised, that I was set to work on Bharat," says the actor, sheepishly.

Given the command Khan enjoys on set, Arora says he can be intimidating if not given the "space he deserves". "Salman sir needs his space because he deserves it; he has earned it. He is a force of nature, and if you intrude, you will feel intimidated. I always got to share [screen] space with him, and, in the process, we built a rapport. Egos were absent. In fact, since the film is set in four to five different time periods, it was interesting to reconnect in a new avatar."

Having shined in small-budget films like Titli (2014) and Brahman Naman (2016), Arora cherished the process of working on the "biggest set" he's been on. "I have never been part of such a big production, so this was new. The scale was huge and we had some of the finest technicians from around the globe working with us. There was a lot to learn."