Sunny Pawar, the eight-year-old Mumbai boy who attended the Oscar awards ceremony as part of the cast of Lion, returned home to a royal welcome on Wednesday morning.
Accompanied by his father Dilip Pawar, a former sweeper and now his son’s business manager, Sunny sat on the trolley stacked high with luggage as he was wheeled out of the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport.
A large number of people cheered and waved even as a battalion of journalists braced for an encounter with the young celebrity.
Though appearing a tad weary from the long-haul flight, Sunny was a bundle of energy. He smiled and waved back as bouncers struggled to keep their valuable subject safe from the mobbing crowds.
Some emotional elderly family members and relatives, including his grandfather Bhima Pawar, garlanded him, offered him sweets and blessed him.
One of the stars of the Oscar-nominated film Lion even took a few quick questions from the media.
“I am very happy and enjoyed attending the Oscars ceremony,” he told a journalist.
To another, he shot back: “I will continue to study and also pursue my acting career.”
The grade three student of a school at Kalina was selected out of a Indian-wide talent hunt of 2,000 children and cleared the audition in Mumbai and Pune to finally land the role in Garth Davis’ Lion.
Welcoming him with a tight hug and tears of joy, Sunny’s mother Vasu Pawar said she was at a complete loss to describe her feelings.
“I have no words to express my happiness over my son’s achievement,” Vasu said outside the family’s modest home.
Grandpa Bhima told a private TV channel that the entire family was extremely proud of Sunny and how he achieved so much in life at such a tender age.
“We have not yet watched the film. But when it is released, our entire family will watch Sunny’s performance,” said Bhima.
Lion is the story of a five-year-old Saroo Brierley, who was stranded in a train that catapulted him hundreds of kilometres away from home to the busy Kolkata.
There, he managed to eke out an existence on footpaths, before a young Australian couple adopts him.
The elder version of Saroo was played by Dev Patel in the film. The role of his foster parents was played by David Wenham and Nicole Kidman.
Some 25 years later, Saroo takes the help of Google Earth to trace out his real family and finally returns from Australia to his home in Madhya Pradesh.
