SI Subhash Shinde with the team

The story of Senior Inspector Subhash Shinde, a farmer’s son from Ratnagiri who arrived in Mumbai with the dream of becoming a fast bowler, is set to find new life in Bollywood, as his daughter’s book Safed Khaki prepares for a feature-film adaptation.

Shinde, now 56 and heading the Bandra Traffic Division, spent more than four decades in the Maharashtra Police, much of it in the Crime Branch. But long before the khaki uniform defined him, cricket did. For a brief period in his youth, he trained in the 1990-established Bombay Cricket Association-Mafatlal Bowling Scheme, where Mumbai cricket well-wisher Dr Makarand Waingankar was chief coordinator. Under the watchful eyes of English fast-bowling great Frank Tyson, the scheme produced a generation of Indian talent— Abey Kuruvilla, Paras Mhambrey, Sairaj Bahutule, Salil Ankola and Nilesh Kulkarni among them.

Shinde’s own stint in the programme was short but transformative. His daughter, Atharwa, described it as “a reminder of how discipline, opportunity and the right mentorship can shape the destiny of a young cricketer”.

But life pulled Shinde in another direction. Family responsibilities forced him away from professional cricket and into the police force; a decision that postponed, but never extinguished, his sporting ambitions.

It was decades later, in the thick of his service career, that Shinde reclaimed his sporting passion. On November 11, 2011, a day he has tattooed on his hand, he formed a police cricket team from scratch in Navi Mumbai Rural. Against expectations, the team went on to win tournaments across the MCA and state cricket circuits, including the Times Shield, Government Shield, DY Patil Tournament, Kanga League, Kurla Bapat Tournament, Thane Vaibhav Tournament and several MCA-affiliated office and corporate tournaments.

Speaking to Sunday mid-day, he said: “My dream was to become a cricketer, but it remained unfulfilled. Cricket is a religion for me and police duty is my life. I’m proud that my khaki uniform has now inspired a story that carries both colours, white and khaki.”

In 2019, Atharwa Shinde, a clinical psychologist and author, attempted to capture this duality of duty and passion in her book Safed Khaki. “I wanted to immortalize his real-life journey of police duty and cricket,” she said. “To have such experienced and gifted creative minds bring life to my story feels like a blessing, something I will cherish forever.”

The book first reached the late National Award-winning filmmaker Nishikant Kamat, known for Dombivali Fast, Mumbai Meri Jaan, Force, and Drishyam, who was moved enough to begin adapting it. After his sudden death, the project stalled — until it found a new champion in writer-filmmaker Farhad Samji.

Samji, known for big-ticket films including Bachchhan Paandey and Kisi Ka Bhai Kisi Ki Jaan (both of which he directed), as well as Singham, Sooryavanshi, and  the Golmaal and Housefull franchises, is now co-writing the screenplay and dialogues with Piyush Singh. Shinde said, “I feel immense joy and deep gratitude that Farhad Samji is writing the screenplay and dialogues for my story.”

Lending lyrical emotion to the film is Nitin Ramesh Tendulkar, elder brother of Sachin Tendulkar and a respected lyricist in Marathi cinema. Atharwa describes his work as “beautifully sensitive and emotionally expressive”, and says his contribution is vital to the film’s soul.

Safed Khaki is pitched as an underdog saga. “It blends cricket and crime in a way never seen before,” Atharwa says. “It’s about a man who chose to transform his unfulfilled dreams into inspiration for generations to come.”

She adds: “I grew up watching my father balance two worlds — the khaki uniform and his love for cricket. This book is my tribute to his resilience, and I never imagined it would one day become a film.”

Atharwa’s earlier self-help book Becoming You, and her film stories based on true events, have also been well received. But Safed Khaki is the closest to home.

As the project moves from page to screen, its makers see it as more than a police or cricket story — it is a reminder that ambition does not always fade with age or obligation — it simply finds a new way to breathe.

Some stories wear uniforms. But their spirit, as Shinde’s journey suggests, remains evergreen.

Director Akshat Ajay Sharma was willing to wait a year instead of approaching any other actor for Haddi. When he wrote Haddi that revolves around a transgender woman who rises through the ranks to become a feared criminal, he could only imagine Nawazuddin Siddiqui in the titular role. The director’s belief paid off as the actor gave his nod as soon as he read the script.

“Without Nawaz, there is no Haddi. He reads all his scripts. Given his busy schedule, it was a task to get him to sit down with me for three hours. But once he read the script, he said yes immediately,” recalls Sharma.

“He was my only choice for this role. Why do you think I waited a whole year for him and didn’t pitch it to anyone else?”

With Siddiqui coming on board the ZEE5 film, the director knew the biggest hurdle was behind them. The role demanded intense research and prep. While the character’s physical appearance was an aspect that needed attention, the filmmaker was more focused on the emotional graph.

“We had the best people [to handle] the character’s look. With Priyanka [Mundada, costume designer] and Subhash [Shinde, hair, make-up and prosthetics expert], the appearance was never a worry. The task was to dissect the character’s psyche—the sensitivity, the strength, the bond of sisterhood, and the vengeance of someone who had lost everything. I love how Nawaz absorbs everything that a filmmaker desires of him, then he gives that and more.”

The crime drama, also starring Anurag Kashyap as a gangster-turned-politician and Ila Arun, went on floors in Delhi in July 2022. Before facing the camera, Siddiqui spent time with the transgender community in the capital, understanding their psyche, desires and fears.

The actor shares, “I never considered that I was playing the role of a transgender woman. I always thought I was portraying a female character. When I lived with transgender women and talked to them, what came out strongly was their desire to become women. It’s this wish that fuels their personality. So, for me, it was a valuable lesson not to play this role superficially, but to embody a woman’s emotions regardless of my own physicality. The film was shot from a female perspective.”

A weak-looking character (not in terms of physique) is half the battle lost, or so believes makeup and hair expert Subhash Shinde, who helped Shraddha Kapoor metamorphose into Haseena Parkar while shooting the biopic on the dreaded female gang lord. He was also in-charge of transforming her brother, actor Siddhanth Kapoor into Haseena's brother, Dawood Ibrahim in director Apoorva Lakhia's biopic on one of Mumbai's most prominent mafia queens. It's co-produced by Haseena's cousin Sameer Antulay and Babu Tyagi, and produced by Nahid Khan.

“I went by the script and dug out pictures of Haseena and Dawood from the internet. The challenge was to make someone as delicate-looking as Shraddha to look like a woman who became a domineering gang leader after she was wronged on several levels. Her basic look had to transform from a 17-year-old girl to a 55-year-old woman who has seen struggle. With Siddhanth, it was a different challenge. I had to match his appearance with Dawood's. If he didn't come close to what Dawood looked like, his character wouldn't have made an impact. A biopic or a film based on real incidents needs actors to look as much like the people they play as possible,“ says Subhash Shinde, who has also worked on Aishwarya Rai Bachchan's get-up in Sarbjit.

Subhash worked on Shraddha's skin tone to make it look rough. As he added years to her appearance, he also made her skin look pigmented and dull in portions, something that commonly occurs in an individual's skin tone over the years. “Shraddha couldn't have had a peaches-and-cream complexion in the film because that's not what her character demands. I had someone sketch Shraddha and Siddhanth to get an idea of how they'd look with prosthetics. Then, I blended in colours to see which skin tone really suits them. And then, we got down to doing look tests. Apoorva was very involved; he saw to it that while shooting, we didn't just touch up faces but also hands and other parts of the body that are visible in a scene. Like Shraddha's face couldn't have looked 55 and hands, 25. I conducted just two look tests on Shraddha and Siddhanth because I had already tested all the appearances on other junior actors with similar features,“ recalls Subhash, adding that while it took two-three hours for the actors to get into hair and makeup, it took only 20 minutes for them to slip out of it.

As opposed to what is believed, the film hasn't been too big on the use of prosthetics. Siddhanth's double chin and Shraddha's swollen face are among the few areas where prosthetic make-up was introduced. “Shraddha and Siddhanth looked heavy with the help of padding beneath their clothes. We just had to do the needful for their face. Even when I was working with Aishwarya in Sarbjit, I used shading to give her face the requisite age. Too much use of prosthetics can make the look seem artificial. With films getting closer to reality, one has to be careful about this because it impacts the narrative,“ says Subhash.

Haseena Parkar, presented by Swiss Entertainment releases tomorrow.

Make-up artist Subhash Shinde, who has been part of Bollywood films like Goliyon Ki Raasleela Ram-leela, Grand Masti, Patiala House and Jaane Kahan Se Aayi Hai, is happy that his work in Omung Kumar-directed Mary Kom is being appreciated. The biopic has also earned him the distinction of being the country's first make-up artist to use prosthetics in an Indian film, as till now, our filmmakers have always depended on foreign talent for special makeg up. Says he, “I'm grateful to Omung for believing that I'll be able to match up to Hollywood standards.“

About his experience of working on the film, he says, “It took two-three trials to get Priyanka's (Chopra) bald look right, but she was very encouraging.“ For the boxing ring sequences, Subhash had to give PeeCee a 'wounded' look. He recounts, “I visited many hospitals and observed minute details; I wanted to create a clear distinction between old and fresh wounds.“