Mithun Chakraborty, a National Film Award-winning Indian film actor as well as social activist. In his heyday, he earned a huge fan following as a dancing star, and was one of the most popular and leading actors of India in the 80s. Mithun has appeared in more than 200 Bollywood films as well as some Bengali and Bhojpuri films. Born in Barisal (now in Bangladesh) and educated at the Scottish Church College, Calcutta, he attended and graduated from the Film and Television Institute of India. Mithun, a staunch Naxalite joined the film industry due to a tragedy when his only brother got accidentally electrocuted and killed in a freak accident. Mithun made his film debut in the 1976 Mrinal Sen directed film Mrigaya and played some supporting roles in films such as Do Anjaane (1976) and Phool Khile Hain Gulshan Gulshan (1977) which did not gain him any recognition. With Disco Dancer (1982), a breakthrough role remains a cult favourite to this day. He starred in many successful romantic and family drama films and was widely recognized as an action hero. He was regarded as a rival to Amitabh Bachchan since his characterization was similar to Bachchan's films. He has worked with some of the biggest actresses of his time like Zeenat Aman, Padmini Kolhapure, Rati Agnihotri, Rekha, Sridevi, Madhuri Dixit to name a few. Mithun achieved not only commercial success but also tremendous critical acclaim with his performances in Mrigaya (1976), Tahader Katha (1992) and Swami Vivekananda (1996) and won National Film Awards. Later he shifted his focus from mainstream Hindi cinema in mid '90 and went into starring in low-budget B-grade movies which were produced to cater to the audiences of Madhya Pradesh and Bihar and Mithun has a cult-following even today.

Mithun made a comeback to the mainstream film Hindi film industry in 2005 with the film Elaan and continued acting in supporting roles. His recent film Guru (2006) was a critical success. His upcoming films are Khel Khel Mein which is in post-production, Samir Karnik's Heroes and Zindagi Tera Naam.