A popular Bollywood film and television actor and model, Shiv Pandit is best known for his roles in Shaitaan (2011), which won him a nomination at the Filmfare Awards for Best Debut Male and the Tamil-language film Leelai (2012). Apart from films, the actor is a renowned face in the TV industry, he has hosted several popular shows like Jhalak Dikhhla Jaa (2009) and the pre and post-match talk show Extraaa Innings T20 during the Indian Premier League in 2008.
Early Life
Born in Nagpur, Maharashtra, Shiv Pandit went to different schools in Delhi, Karnataka, and Dehradun where he studied at the prestigious Doon School. After completing his schooling, he went to Delhi University to pursue his graduation. The eldest among the three siblings, Shiv has a younger sister, Gayatri Pandit who works as an assistant director in Bollywood and a brother named Arjun who is a sports anchor at Star Sports.
Shiv started his career as a Radio Jockey with Radio Mirchi before he got his big break in the TV industry in 2005 when his friends took him for an audition for the TV commercial of Tide. The following year, he bagged a role in the popular TV sitcom F.I.R where he played the role of a police inspector. Over the next few years, he worked in several TV shows like Jhalak Dikhlaa Jaa, and Rishta.com (2011).
Movie Career
Shiv Pandit started his journey in the film industry with Let’s Enjoy (2004), where he played a supporting role in the film. The film starring Aashish Chaudhary, Roshni Chopra, and Arzoo Govitrikar did not fare well at the box office and was a critical flop. Four years after his debut, in his second feature film of his career, Shiv was cast alongside Shreyas Talpade, Kay Kay Menon, Mahie Gill and Shenaz Treasurywala in the comedy-romance Aagey Se Right. Whilst the film was praised for its looks and design, it failed at the box office.
Whilst his first few films did not earn him much recognition, he won wide critical appreciation for his stellar performance in Shaitaan (2011), a crime thriller directed by Bejoy Nambiar. The film co-starring Rajeev Khandelwal, Kalki Koechlin, Gulshan Devaiya, Neil Bhoopalam, Kirti Kulhari and Rajkummar Rao garnered a positive response from the critics and emerged to be a box office hit. Following his success with Shaitaan, the actor made his debut in a Tamil film with Leelai where he played the lead role alongside a fellow debutante Manasi Parekh. The film directed by Andrew Louis garnered positive reviews with Shiv winning appreciation from both critics and audience alike.
In his only release of 2013, Shiv collaborated with director Anthony D’Souza for the action drama film Boss, which was the remake of the Malayalam film Pokkiri Raja. The film featuring Akshay Kumar, Mithun Chakraborty, Aditi Rao Hydari andRonit Roy received mixed critical reviews. Over the next couple of years, the actor appeared in films like Mumbai Delhi Mumbai (2014) and 7 Hours To Go (2016) both of which failed at the box office. His 2017 release includes Mantra, a Hindi-English bilingual film directed by Nicholas Kharkongor.
TV Career
Shiv Pandit started his career in the TV industry as the host of Studio Disney (2005), which was aired on Disney Channel. The same year, he appeared in one of the episodes of Bombay Talking, a soap, where the played the role of Kunal Khosla. He rose to fame with his stint with Extraaa Innings T20, a pre and post-match show during the Indian Premier League where he played the host. The following year, he hosted the season three of the popular reality dance TV show Jhalak Dikhhla Jaa. His other popular TV series’ appearances include Rishta.com (2011) and Dr. Bhanumati On Duty (2016).