A nickname can come from almost anywhere. Sometimes it’s affectionate. Sometimes it’s teasing. Occasionally, it’s downright ridiculous. And sometimes the story behind it is better than the nickname itself.
Take Tiger Shroff. He wasn’t born Tiger. His name was Jai Hemant Shroff. “Tiger” was a childhood nickname, reportedly inspired by his habit of biting people when he was young.
It sounds like the sort of family joke that should have disappeared with childhood. Instead, it became the name on the movie posters.
Then there’s Sonam Kapoor. Her father Anil Kapoor has called her Giraffe, a teasing reference to her height. It’s hardly the sort of name one imagines being lovingly bestowed upon a future fashion icon.
But that’s the thing about family nicknames. They aren’t trying to protect your celebrity image.
And then there is Aftab Shivdasani, whose childhood nickname was Faffy. No explanation is quite as satisfying as simply saying that someone who grew up to become a Bollywood actor was once known at home as Faffy.
But perhaps02is the most interesting example because the name managed to survive the journey from childhood into full-blown stardom.
Govinda has spoken about the nickname and its association with the little finger. What may have begun as a family expression eventually became so closely linked to the actor that “Chi Chi” could sit beside “Govinda” without needing an introduction.
That’s the unusual thing about these names. A nickname is normally supposed to shrink a person down, make them younger, closer, more familiar. Bollywood sometimes does the opposite. It takes that tiny family name and makes it enormous.
Tiger became a screen identity. Chi Chi became a superstar’s shorthand. Giraffe remained a family joke. Faffy stayed mostly behind closed doors.
Four names. Four completely different journeys. And perhaps that’s what makes Bollywood’s nickname history so much more entertaining than a simple list of who was called what. The name is only the beginning. The story is what happened to it afterwards.
