A Gurgaon boy who trained at the Film and Television Institute of India, Rajkummar Rao (born Raj Kumar Yadav) built his reputation the hard way — one uncompromising performance at a time. After his debut in Love Sex Aur Dhokha (2010), his shattering portrayal of slain lawyer Shahid Azmi in Shahid (2013) won him the National Film Award for Best Actor and marked him as the standard-bearer of India's new indie wave.

What sets Rao apart is his refusal to be boxed in: he starved himself for the one-man survival drama Trapped, charmed as a small-town clerk in Bareilly Ki Barfi, and played a duty-bound election officer in Newton, India's Oscar entry. The horror-comedy Stree (2018) gave him mainstream clout, and Stree 2 (2024) became one of Hindi cinema's biggest hits. He won a second Filmfare Best Actor prize for Badhaai Do.

Filmography Highlights

• Love Sex Aur Dhokha (2010) — Debut in Dibakar Banerjee's found-footage anthology
• Shahid (2013) — National Award-winning turn as lawyer Shahid Azmi
• Queen (2014) — Memorable as the fiancé who gets left behind
• Trapped (2016) — One-man survival drama; extreme physical transformation
• Newton (2017) — India's Oscar entry; Asia Pacific Screen Award winner
• Stree (2018) — Horror-comedy that made him a mainstream star
• Badhaai Do (2022) — Filmfare Best Actor for playing a closeted gay policeman
• Stree 2 (2024) — His highest-grossing film and a franchise juggernaut

Image: Wikimedia Commons. Part of the Top 50 Bollywood Celebrities series. Ranking inspired by popular industry listings; profiles are original editorial content.