Until that point, the actor's rougher edges had mostly been cheered and celebrated. As an actor, Patekar demonstrated a baggy-eyed naturalism that spoke more to Bombay streetlife than Bollywood fantasy; given to writing out his dialogue until he had internalised it, his growling line readings were both idiosyncratic and much imitated. Satyajit Ray counted among the actor’s most illustrious admirers, but could not find a suitable project for him; Patekar instead had Nair to thank for launching him to international prominence in Salaam Bombay! as Baba Golub, the brutal pimp and drug dealer lording over an army of street children. Even here, though, harsh reality poked through: during shooting, Patekar was accidentally stabbed in the stomach by a young co-star who had disregarded Nair’s instructions.
Yet the Bollywood studios also made good use of his grouchy grit. He was commanding as the kingpin Anna in Parinda, Vidhu Vinod Chopra’s inventive relocation of On the Waterfront, for which he won two best supporting actor awards; he was appointed an honorary captain in the Indian Territorial Army after undergoing three years of training for Prahaar: The Final Attack (1991), a film he also ended up directing. He crossed paths with the emergent megastar Shah Rukh Khan in Raju Ban Gaya Gentleman (1992) and was momentarily in the running for Subhash Ghai’s blockbuster Khalnayak (1993), losing out to Sanjay Dutt.
Relations between Patekar and Dutt deteriorated further after the latter was linked to the 1993 Bombay bus bombings in which Patekar’s brother was killed. (Patekar’s wife, the Marathi actor Neelakanti, was also due to board one of the targeted vehicles.) Even after Dutt’s comeback, Patekar remained defiant: “I have not worked with [Dutt] in 22 years of my career. I will not work with him in the future.” A comparable rage powered Krantiveer, where he played a dissolute gambler reviving his fortunes via social activism. Heart problems meant he shot his final scenes with a doctor on standby; while distributors thought Patekar a commercial risk, the film struck a chord, becoming the third biggest Hindi hit of 1994.
Born Vishwanath Patekar in Murud-Janjira, Maharashtra, Nana was one of the three sons of Dinkar Patekar, a textile painter and businessman, and his wife, Nirmala. He attended Samarth Vidyalaya and the Bandra School of Arts in Mumbai, supporting his family after his father's business collapsed by painting zebra crossings and cinema posters: "I had to come from school at 1.30pm, eat something, walk eight kilometres there and eight kilometres back." He went on to study commercial art at the Sir JJ Institute of Art, where he also joined the drama society.
After graduation, he briefly worked as a police sketch artist before joining the acclaimed Marathi theatre group Rangayan. Switched on to films by his friend, the renowned Indian actor Smita Patil (“I was happy doing theatre, but she insisted”), he made his screen debut in Patil's 1978 social drama Gaman, about a rural migrant trying to establish himself in the big city. (Patil also taught Patekar to drive.) A string of supporting roles followed; two years before Salaam Bombay!, he played Gandhi’s assassin Nathuram Godse in the Emmy-winning TV miniseries Lord Mountbatten: The Last Viceroy.
Despite his success with Krantiveer, for which he won several best actor awards, Patekar was not always the easiest fit with the studio system. He was replaced on Raja (1995) after spending two days hectoring his co-stars Madhuri Dixit and Mukesh Khanna with acting notes. (Upon being replaced by Paresh Rawal, he returned his fee to the producers.) And he paused his career during the Kargil war of 1999 to re-enlist, this time with the Maratha Light Infantry, serving 60 days in Srinigar, Dras and Leh; he lost 20kg in the process, while earning a promotion to the rank of major.
Back on civvy street, he landed a signature role as Inspector Sadhu, the dirty cop who becomes the hero of Ab Tak Chhappan (2004), and swept India's Best Villain prizes as the underworld don Tabrez Alam in Prakash Jha's Aparahan (2005), then switched into a lighter mode for the knockabout comedies Welcome (2007) and Welcome Back (2015). Elder statesman status beckoned: he played Mumbai’s police commissioner in Ram Gopal Varma’s The Attacks of 26/11 (2013), voiced Shere Khan in the Hindi dub of Disney’s The Jungle Book (2016) and enjoyed a major success with the Marathi film Natsamrat (2016), playing an acclaimed actor unravelling in retirement. He was awarded the Padma Shri and the Raj Kapoor special contribution award in 2013; in 2015, he set up the NAAM Foundation with fellow actor Makarand Anaspure to help drought-hit farmers.
Then came Dutta’s 2018 interview with The Hindu, where she repeated an earlier accusation that Patekar had first sexually harassed her while shooting a dance sequence for the unreleased Horn ‘OK’ Pleassss (2009), then sent hired thugs her way after she fled the set; the thugs surrounded Dutta's car, smashing the windscreen and trapping her inside. (The journalist Janice Sequeira, who witnessed the attack, verified Dutta’s account.) Patekar denied the allegations. The Mumbai police opened an investigation; while no formal charges were brought, the incident sparked renewed concern about the treatment of women in Bollywood.
After a spell in industry purdah, Patekar recently attempted a comeback of sorts. There were supporting roles in the propagandistic The Vaccine War (2023), limp comedy Housefull 5 (2025) and the streaming-bound Subedaar (2026), though the actor also lent a wry centre to Vishal Bhardwaj’s Shakespeare riff O’ Romeo (2026), advising caution as the handler to Shahid Kapoor's wayward hitman.
He married Neelakanti in 1978, and they had two sons; the first, Durvasa, died in 1980, aged two. Patekar is survived by his wife and his second son, Malhar.
Nana Patekar, actor and director, born January 1, 1951, died October 8, 2026.
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