The struggle of Jitendra Kumar, who came into the world of entertainment after studying engineering from IIT Kharagpur, is over. Jitendra Kumar, who came to Mumbai 10 years ago, can be called the first digital star of the country. People now recognize Gittu of ‘Permanent Roommates’ as Secretary of ‘Panchayat’. He came to Mumbai under the supervision of his seniors from IIT. Now seeing his success, many other engineers have also taken this path, but Jitendra Kumar says that earning money from acting is not easy here. It takes time. It takes a lot of patience and time.
The son whom the family dreamed of making him an engineer, he left for Mumbai one day to become an artist. Jitendra Kumar’s family members were very angry on this. Jitendra says, ‘I did coaching for two years in Kota in 11th and 12th. Then studied at IIT Kharagpur for four years. There I met Biswapati Sarkar, who was a year senior and used to do street plays. He told me that after finishing his studies, he is going to become a writer and not an engineer by going to Mumbai. Told me, you too come to act.
Counselling is necessary from childhood
Jitendra also believes that in our country, it is very important to have career counselling of children from childhood. He says, “Engineering studies are hard work. More than the child, his entire family works behind him. When this engineer becomes an actor, he goes through the basic process. Seems to work harder. Trying to understand everything in more detail. If these things are known from the beginning, then choosing a career becomes easier.
Reached Mumbai by Garib Rath
Jitendra came to Mumbai for the first time from his home in Alwar by Garib Rath. Landed at Bandra Terminus and got confused in exit after landing on the platform. He says, ‘It took me half an hour to figure out how to get out of here, no one was ready to tell. My mistake was that I had to go to Borivali and the train stopped there, but I didn’t get down. A college friend runs IIT coaching in Borivali, I had to stay there. I had decided that I would keep six days a week for acting and one day for coaching. So started the job there first and acting together.
First film, that took eight years
The condition of Abhishek Tripathi, the secretary in the web series ‘Panchayat’, was similar to Jitendra Kumar’s in Mumbai for a long time. Jitendra explains, ‘It is not easy to earn money from acting here. That is why I had come here for three months in 2012 to take stock of the situation before I decided to settle here. I understood then that it would take time to make an identity here. It is good that at the same time YouTube came into vogue. We started showing our talent there, and then it happened that all the producers came with us and started saying that we also have to make something similar on digital. When I came, I was supposed to act in films, but it took eight years for my first film ‘Gone Kesh’ to release.
With the increasing trend of digital, it was felt that there would be a change in the entertainment world. Democracy will come. But Jitendra Kumar looks at the camp in the entertainment world from a different perspective. He says, ‘According to me, camps are not needed, but it happens that if a camp is making an interesting film, and you think that you are absolutely suitable for it, then I will definitely think that I get that character. What are OTTs, these are also different groups. These are Netflix, Amazon subgroups. Every writer, every actor, every director tries to do something different. So whoever wants to do something different here has to be a part of different camps.
