Making a statement

The 13-year-old dancing prodigy Akshat Singh totally proved that ABCD – i.e. any-body-can-dance. Kolkata born, Mumbai settled Akshat, who started his tryst in TV dance reality shows with 'Dance Bengal Dance', has now made his mark internationally by participating British TV show 'Britain's Got Talent' (BGT), which would be aired on Colors Infinity from June 20. By watching his performance one can surely see that Akshat truly dances from his heart. And his electrifying performance on BGT earned him a 'Golden Buzzer' (In the centre of the judges' desk is a Golden Buzzer and can be pressed once by each judge during the auditions if they think an act deserves to go straight through to the live semi-finals) in the show.

Excerpts from an interview:

When did you realise that you want to become a dancer?

When I was a kid, I watched the movie 'Wanted' and it has a song 'Tera hee jalwa'. Whenever that song played on the television I used to start dancing. Observing that my father asked me if I wanted to dance and I said yes! Subsequently, I joined a dance class, however, after joining the kids in the class started laughing at me and wondered how a fat kid can dance. The stereotyping never affected me. Although at times I felt bad when they used to laugh at me everyone but I took that as an inspiration and vowed to prove that even fat people can dance.

Tell us about your inspiration?

My inspiration is Salman Khan and Michel Jackson. Salman bhai has a golden heart and he is like God to me.

Would you like to act with Salman in a movie?

Yes! He is my role model.

What do you do in your free time?

I study and dance. I manage both my studies and dance. Whenever I am at the airport or hotel I just study and go through my books. For the final exams of eight standard I scored 85 per cent, so with the grace of God and blessings of my dad I am able to do this. My school also helps me in my endevours.

How many hours do you practice?

I practice for two hours in the morning and during evening I do my fitness training for two hours again.

You have done few movies tell us something about that.

I have dome a Malayalam movie 'Ayal Njanalla' and then I did a Tamil and Telugu movie 'Laxmi' along with Prabhu. Currently I worked in a Russian film 'Best Friends' and two other are Hollywood movies.

Do you want to achieve anything in life professionally apart from dance?

As Sachin Tendulkar is a legend of cricket, in the same way I want to be a legend of dance.

What message do you want to give to young aspiring dancers?

It doesn't matter if your fat, short, thin, etc, the only thing that matters is whatever you do should be from the bottom of your heart. One should never be afraid of anything and continue the hard work and results will automatically follow.