Nigel Akkara

Nigel Akkara was born on 13 August 1978 in Kerala, into a Catholic family. His father, Late John Akkara was a businessman and his mother, Usha John was a housewife. Akkara did his schooling from St. Xavier's, Kolkata. He studied in St. Xavier's College Kolkata as a student of Commerce. But he had to leave the college in the final year due to his arrest. At the age of 21, Akkara was arrested with a charge of kidnapping and 17 other cases filed against him.During his days in the correctional home, Akkara did post-graduation in Human Rights from Indian Institute of Human Rights, New Delhi. Later he turned into an actor and made his debut with 2012 Bengali film Muktodhara.[1]

Breakthrough

During his period in the prison, under the initiative of IG prison B.D. Sharma, various kinds of cultural programs started taking place in the correctional home. And this is when Akkara found a flicker of hope coming under the wings of dance-drama coach Alakananda Roy, while taking part in a dance workshop. Once he took interest in dance and act based artistic performance, he found his passion, acting. The actor got accolades for his first stage performance Balmiki Pratibha.

Debut (2012)

Akkara made his acting debut in the year 2012 with Shiboprosad Mukherjee and Nandita Roy's Bengali movie Muktodhara. In this movie, Akkara shared the screen with National Award-winning actress Rituparna Sengupta. Here, he played the character of a prisoner who changes himself into a positive person after getting in touch of a female dance drama coach while staying in the jail. The film turned out to be a major hit in the box office and Akkara's performance as a newcomer was praised by both the viewers and the critics.[2]

After Muktodhara, Akkara acted in movies like Orissa (2013), Yoddha: The Warrior (2014), Rajkahini (2015), Asamapta: Incompete (2016) and Gotro (2019).

He has acted in noted plays such as BalmikiPratibha, Bewarish and JhorafulerRupkatha.

Other work

Nigel Akkara is an active social worker who takes part in various initiatives that help people who were once imprisoned and get scared to start fresh feeling stigmatized in the society. In order to spread awareness of theatre therapy, Akkara has recently conducted motorbike campaign from Kolkata to China border via North Sikkim.

Nigel Akkara is married to Moumita. Akkara keeps his religious belief in humanity.

Nigel Akkara is a businessman as well. He has formed his own company called "Kolkata Facility Management Pvt. Ltd." where he appoints ex-prisoners to let them start normal lives. As a CSR program of the same business, Akkara has formed "Kolahol Theatre Workshop". This workshop is the platform where he brings socially stigmatized people and trains them through Theatre therapy to turn them into trained stage actors. Being the founder of "Kolahol Theatre Workshop", Akkara has already produced three dramas successfully. His dramas "Jhora Fuler Rupkatha", "Bisakto Panchali" and "Bewarish" offered scopes to the transgenders belonging to LGBT community, sex workers and drug addicts.

• Muktodhara (2012)
• Orissa Malayalam feature film
• Onnyo na
• Yoddha: The Warrior (2014)
• Onnyo Apala (2015)
• Rajkahini (2015)
• Virus (2016)
• Asamapto (2017)
• Jingel Bell (2018)(unreleased)
• Gotro (2019)
• Tirandaj Shabor[3]

• E Amar Gurudakshina (2017)