Satnam Singh had a cameo in the Punjabi film Bathinda Express

By 20, Satnam Singh has already achieved much more than most of us can dream of in our lifetimes. He made it all the way out of a tiny farming village in Punjab to the IMG Academy in Florida, became a star for India's national basketball team, became the first Indian to be drafted into the NBA, and even got his own basketball card with his NBDL team, the Texas Legends.

But after making history around the basketball world, Satnam returned home to Punjab to gain another feather on the cap above his very large head: a cameo in a Punjabi film.

Satnam returned to the court in Ludhiana when he first started playing basketball as a nine-year-old to shoot a scene for the film 'Bhatinda Express', a Punjabi movie directed by Deep Joshi and starring Deep Joshi and Jasmine Kaur. The film was released over a month ago (April 8), and if my brief Instagram research is correct, it fared well among its target audience.

The film is about Inder (Joshi), a guy who's supposed to be so charming (says the synopsis on its trailer on YouTube) that he turns even 'haters into admirers'. Cool, then. Inder is a runner who falls in love, jokes with friends, runs, has a downfall, and probably rises up again.

But I'm not here for Inder's story. I'm here for those two seconds in the trailer (1:17-1:19) when Joshi is on a basketball court attempting to impress his love interest (Kaur) and her friends before bumping into the 7-foot-2 frame of Satnam Singh. A longer cut of the scene from Satnam's instagram feed (appropriately named SINGH IS KING) shows Satnam handing Joshi a ball and encouraging him with a head motion that is a loose translation to casually go ahead and 'chak de phatte'.

Here's the trailer for Bhatinda Express. Look for Satnam (in his IMG Basketball jersey!) from the 1:17 mark:



I'm only hoping that there is more to Satnam in this film than this short scene. If I got an opportunity to star and direct in my own sequel, I would have a scene just chilling with the big guy at Ludhiana's Aman Chicken eating the best Butter Chicken on Planet Earth and discussing ways to move above Zaza Pachulia in the rotation for the Dallas Mavericks.