Dancing Uncle sets Internet on fire again

The professor is a man of few words. But when he gets moving to groovy tunes, he dances up a hell of a storm — one that gets the whole nation hooked. And leaves even Govinda impressed. After winning hordes of admirers with his video of dancing to Aapke aa jaane se at a wedding, Sanjeev Srivastava  aka Dancing Uncle has gone viral again — this time grooving to Hrithik Roshan’s hit number Kaho na pyar hai.

Shooting to viral fame has changed life radically for Srivastava, an electronics professor at Bhabha Engineering Research Institute. “Everything has changed and it all feels very confusing right now. I got 1,000 calls in just a week and I obviously couldn’t answer all. It was exciting but also stressful. I haven’t gone to teach in college for the last five weeks. I’m in Mumbai now and I have no idea what life has in store for me,” says the man with the killer moves.

Sanjeev Srivastava with Govinda and Madhuri Dixit.

He created his twitter account on 31 May this year, and by July 5 he had 8,213 followers. A video of the dance that he posted on Twitter on July 3 has already received over 1,300 ‘likes’.

“I have been named the Dancing Uncle and people are following me on Twitter, Facebook, Youtube and other social media platforms. I did not know much about social media and now too I don’t know too well how to operate them. I am truly overwhelmed and feel very lucky,” he says.

Dance has always been his passion, and he started dancing at the age of 10. “My mother was a Bharatnatyam dancer. I picked up a few moves of that dance form and created my own moves from it,” he says. But in 1999 he met with an accident that left his left knee injured. And that put an end to all dreams of taking up dancing professionally. “Now I dance just at parties and on Sundays. I have my parents, children and wife to look after, so I don’t really get much time to indulge in my passion for dancing,” he says.

Srivastava has been teaching electronics for 13 years. And rates himself as quite a friendly and genial teacher. He says, “I’m not a strict professor. I like sharing knowledge, and bond with my students, and as a result I get a lot of respect from them. I am fair, but firm when needed.”

About his hobbies apart from dancing, he says, “I love theatre and used to attend rehearsals for plays. I love listening to music and Jagjit Singh’s ghazals are an all-time favourite. My favourite dancer is Mithun Chakraborty since 1982 and I still try to copy his moves. Before that, my idol was Shammi Kapoor, I loved to watch his dance moves. I admire Hrithik Roshan and recently saw Tiger Shroff dancing very well and worthy of praise. The new era of dancing has begun.”

Basking in his newfound fame, and happy to be winning praise for doing what he loves doing most, he says, “At this point of time, I’m not being able to fully comprehend what is really going on in my life but the message that I would like to pass on to people is: Music and dance are great stress-busters and they make one feel better. The scope for dancing has increased in our country. I am 47 years old but still feel young. I plan to open a dance school in Bhopal where I will conduct dance classes on Sundays. As of now, I’m focusing on getting my life in order and on track. I have been approached by many people who want to sign contracts with me and are keen to work with me. I feel so lucky.”