Remember when those desi beauties like Vidya Balan, Bhumika Chawla , Tabu and Gracy Singh shocked their fans by trying to adopt a Western look?

Seems their style debacle is yet to teach a lesson to apna Bollywood’s chocolate boys, eager to adopt a macho image.

Recently, at an awards function, a much-muscled Shahid Kapur had the audience in splits. And no, it was no comedy performance. Instead, the audience seemed to find a baby face on those six packs a bitter pill to swallow. Even Himesh Reshammiya’s newer, macho avataar at the same function drew an almost a similar response.

So, why do the not-so-macho men in our industry insist on beefing up? LT does a style check...

Holistic health guru of celebs, Mickey Mehta, feels that it's high time now that the chocolate heroes stopped imitating macho men.

“This trend has been in existence in Hindi film industry for years now. Instead those soft-looking heroes like Shahid, Dino and many more should realise the potential of their looks and exploit them. One would never see any Hollywood actors copying the others. Imagine how funny it would be if Brad Pitt tries to build a body like Sylvester Stallone!”

Mehta further adds, “Not everybody’s blessed like Hrithik Roshan and Salman Khan, both of whom can easily flit between their soft looks and a more macho avataar. And exceptions like King Khan are rare.”

Agreeing completely with Mickey is well-known stylist Doris Godambe, who recently did the styling for King Khan in OSO. “Being public figures, I wonder how celebs are ready to make fun of themselves in public! These young actors are trying to copy Shah Rukh Khan, but in the process they are forgetting that he first made his mark in the industry with his God-gifted looks, and now after years of experience he went for an image makeover with OSO.”

Manzoor Khan, another prominent stylist who is behind Himesh Reshammiya’s waxed-chest look believes that an actor can never be satisfied with his look. He explains, “There is a continuous fear in actors today of getting typecast in a particular look. And so there’s a mad rush among even chocolate boys to gain those iron muscles. But they forget to do their home-work before trying it, and end up making fun of themselves. The live example to this is Shahid Kapur.”

Ultimately, at the end of the day the true test of a makeover is by the fans’ response. And after Shahid's recent muscled look at the awards function, his female fans seemed to be quite disappointed. Mallika Pant, pursuing her graduation, says, “I don't know why actors don’t feel content in whatever they have? Who’s interested in seeing Shahid’s muscles when we have Salman Khan in our industry? These actors don’t realise their own potential and end up becoming a laughing stock.”

IT executive Jagriti Chauhan too sounds disgusted with the trend when she says: “These not-so-tough heroes play havoc with their assets while trying to experiment. Probably, they think that it will lend a masculinity to their persona and by doing so they will be able to compete with the macho men of the industry.”

The verdict is clear, it seems: Don't experiment!