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Dev (Devesh) Patel, born on 23rd April 1990, in Brent, Greater London, England, to Hindu Gujarati Indian parents, both of whom were born in Nairobi, Kenya. His mother Anita Patel is a carer and his father Raj Patel an IT consultant. Dev Patel, who grew up in Harrow, attended Longfield Primary School and later went to Whitmore High School, receiving an A* in GCSE Drama, for his “self-penned portrayal of a child in the Beslan school siege”. He eventually completed his AS Levels in 2007, while he was working in Skins.
As a martial artist, he is a black belt in Taekwondo and was a bronze medalist at the 2004 AIMAA World Championships in Dublin. Patel started training at the Rayners Lane Academy of Taekwon-do in 2000.
Patel began his acting career in late 2006, when he auditioned for the E4 TV teen drama series Skins. After two auditions, he was cast in the role of Anwar Kharral, a British Pakistani Muslim teenager. In August 2007, Patel was cast in the role of Jamal Malik, the central character in Danny Boyle’s independent film Slumdog Millionaire. He also stated that it was Boyle’s daughter, a fan of Skins, who initially recommended Patel for the role. The character Jamal Malik, the protagonist, is an Indian Muslim boy born and raised in the poverty of Mumbai, India. Boyle considered hundreds of young male actors, although he found that Bollywood leads were generally “strong, handsome hero-types”, not the personality he was looking for.
After the release of Slumdog Millionaire at the end of 2008, Patel went on to receive a number of awards for his performance, including a British Independent Film Award, National Board of Review (NBR) Award, Chicago Film Critics Association Award, and two Black Reel Awards for Best Actor and Best Breakthrough Performance.
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