190 Sarika Sharma The camera follows Ghalib through most of the 98-minute film. As a truck driver struggling with grief in Ivan Ayr’s ‘Meel Patthar’ (‘Milestone’), that attention seems to have followed the lead actor, played by Suvinder Vicky, beyond the 70 mm. His portrayal of Ghalib has earned him praise from not just leading critics and filmmakers like Hansal Mehta, but also won him an award for best actor at the Singapore International Film Festival’s Silver Screen Awards. The phone has been buzzing ever since the film began streaming on Netflix last week. The film is about seasoned Punjabi truck driver Ghalib, a widower scarred by his past, against the backdrop of a crumbling capitalistic system. Chandigarh-based Vicky says the character is far removed from the stereotypical image of truck drivers in urban minds — loud, dhaba-type. “He rarely wears a parna and speaks little,” says Vicky. And that is where the challenge for him lay, something he hadn’t imagined when he was offered the role.