Some people start their acting career at an early age. But, for others, acting begins after retirement from their job. For Zarksis Khandadia from Mumbai, his golden period began, after retiring from his job with Central Bank of India. Being good in the game of table tennis, Zarksis focused his attention on this game after his retirement from bank’s service. In the Veterans’ event he went on to bag many titles, till date. Today, he is an unbeaten champion in 69+ category in most of the Veterans’ singles event.
Zarksis receiving his PYC Gym 69+ champion trophy from Suhas Dandekar
But, multifaceted personality that he is, Zarksis also tried his luck in Bollywood. Initially, after his retirement from job, he prepared his portfolio and even gave auditions to different film productions. Zarksis got selected in a multi starrer 2002 Hindi film ‘Hum Kisise kam Nahin’. Thereafter, there was no stopping for him. He was selected for supporting roles in many films like ‘OMG’, ‘Holiday’ , ‘Ek Tha Tiger’ and so on. He even played father of Priyanka Chopra in one of the films. But, Zarksis liked the role of a Pakistani Minister , which he played in Salman Khan film ‘Ek Tha Tiger’.
Zarksis with 59+ TT Champion Prakash Kelkar
He proudly shows the his photos clicked with all the popular artistes, including Salman Khan and Vidya Balan. With Vidya Balan he had done an ad for Nihar hair Oil. Talking about his favourite role, Zarksis mentions about the film ‘Ek Tha Tiger’.
Magzmumbai met Zarksis during the Veterans’ State ranking TT tourney at PYC Gymkhana , Pune last week. Zarksis did win in the category of 69+ with ease, defeating all those, whom he encountered on his way to finals. In finals, he defeated Pune’s Deshpande.
Zarksis with Salman Khan
Being passionate about the game of Table tennis, we asked him as to how did he manage his acting assignments and the ever smiling fair, tall and handsome senior citizen said, “I adjust my schedule in films, so that it doesn’t interfere with my tournament dates.”
Zarksis is now preparing hard for the Veterans’ National championship scheduled for January 2017 after which he would certainly take up few film assignments. It was a pleasure interacting with this cheerful gentleman.