While reading the script of his next project, Babil gets ready for a photo shoot with BT in his Oshiwara home, where he moved in with his parents, Irrfan and Sutapa Sikdar, and brother Ayaan, when he was 17.

Wearing a blue shirt made from three shawls recycled by his mother, paired with yellow pants, he says, “I’m bad at photoshoots. They are so structured, so I get a little lost.” In a conversation with us, he talks about letting go of the pressure of proving himself as an actor and how his upbringing has influenced his career choices. Excerpts:

Babil firmly believes that an actor needs to find a character within themselves. “It’s a myth when actors say, ‘I’m getting into a character’. I don’t think you can become another person. I feel every kind of person already exists within you. It’s just that you don’t confront that part of you. The moment you surrender to yourself, you can shed parts that are not the character and keep the parts that are like the character.”

The actor who received critical acclaim for his work in the recent web show, The Railway Men (TRM), believes that these projects brought about a positive change in him.

“I cannot depend on any project and hang on to its success. I move on. However, TRM has influenced my self-belief in a positive way. I am more excited about art. Before it, I wanted to prove a lot, but the baggage of proving myself as an actor has reduced a lot now. I have realized that the feeling of proving yourself should not bring you down. Earlier, it would eat me up, but now, wanting to prove myself has become a positive feeling.”

“You can either choose to have a strong character or an easy life,” Babil says during the conversation. The thought sounds intriguing, but does Babil believe he has a strong character? The Qala actor answers, “I was born in a very small family, I don’t come from money as such. I was raised very modestly; I wouldn’t even say we were a middle-class family. When I was born, baba was doing television, and he had to beg producers for his money, and mamma was writing. They were both working parents. I think when I was 12 or 13, they started seeing success and for the first time, I saw comfort in their eyes. They still didn’t give me money (laughs). I don’t take myself very seriously at all. Right now, I have to be very careful with my ego, especially with not having mamma around as she is busy, and I don’t have any friends. So, I spend a lot of time with myself.”

Babil wears his vulnerability on his sleeves. While a certain section states his articulate responses are a publicity gimmick, he reveals that he is often censored by his publicists. He shares, “It does feel like a cage sometimes. But it’s only a cage if you look at it like that. If they don’t do their jobs, I will not be able to do my job. Public perception is a beast of its own, so if they don’t take care of that, and I do that myself, I won’t be able to focus on my art.”

Three films old, Babil is one of those rare industry kids, who have not faced criticism for their background. “When my father passed away, the initial reaction I got was sympathy and positivity. After a point, if I had let go of my values and done things that would not have aligned with my values – like not giving an audition or making certain phone calls – it would have brought me negativity. At home, I have been taught that humanity prevails over any kind of success. That is the real reason why I have been perceived positively by people. I could never go on a set thinking I don’t deserve to be there.”