The Real Life Indian Boy That Dev Patel Plays

Saroo's life in a small village in Khandwa, Madhya Pradesh, changed dramatically overnight when he fell asleep on a train that took him more than 1,500 kilometres across India – penniless, hungry and alone – at just five years of age, into the busy, bustling city of Kolkata.

Dev Patel, who was nominated for an Academy Award for actor in a supporting role for his part in Lion, told the Los Angeles Times: “I’m gonna get in the car, and then I’m gonna go get in the shower and probably break down. I’ve been holding it in. I need a good cry in the shower.”

It has been an intense portrayal for the Slumdog Millionaire kid who is now a young man. But the real-life Saroo’s journey has been more dramatic than a Bollywood Salim-Javed lost-and-found 1980s saga of separated siblings.