Highlights:
- Vikas Singh Panwar won ₹50 lakh in November 2025, then cleared UPSC on his first attempt with All India Rank 159
- Ravi Mohan Saini won ₹1 crore on KBC Junior at 14 and later joined the IPS
- Achin and Sarthak Narula remain the only winners of the full ₹7 crore jackpot
- Not every story is a success story, and Sushil Kumar's is the one most often cited as a warning
- KBC is on its 18th season, with Amitabh Bachchan still in the host's chair
KBC is in its 18th season and has been on air for more than 25 years. Amitabh Bachchan has hinted again at stepping back, though similar lines in the past turned out to mean nothing, and Sony hasn't announced any change. It's a good moment to ask what happens to the people the show made famous once the cameras go off.
1. Vikas Singh Panwar, ₹50 lakh, 2025
Vikas Singh PanwarX/@viralbhayani77
The newest name on this list. Panwar, a 22-year-old from Jubli village near Shimla, won ₹50 lakh in November 2025. When UPSC announced the civil services results on March 6, 2026, he had cleared the exam on his first attempt with All India Rank 159, scoring 988 marks. Which service he'll join depends on the allocation that follows, and that hasn't been reported yet.
2. Ravi Mohan Saini, ₹1 crore, KBC Junior 2001
Ravi Mohan SainiX/@MbPradas
Saini was a Class 10 student when he answered all 15 questions on KBC Junior. He later finished an MBBS, then cleared the UPSC exam in 2014 with an All India Rank of 461 and joined the Indian Police Service in the Gujarat cadre. He has said he went on the show mainly because he wanted to meet Amitabh Bachchan.
3. Harshvardhan Nawathe, ₹1 crore, Season 1, 2000
Harshvardhan NawatheX/@LexisNexisIndia
India's first KBC crorepati was 27 when he won. He has said he wasn't ready for what came next, but he went on to do an MBA at a UK university, built a corporate career and now leads corporate social responsibility work for various organizations. He described the win as a net to build his life on, and he returned to the show for its 25th anniversary special.
4. Rahat Taslim, ₹1 crore, Season 4, 2010
Taslim stitched clothes for people in her area of Jharkhand and didn't have a bank account when she won. She used the prize to build a three-storey house and open her own garment showroom, turning a trade she already knew into a business she owned.
5. Anil Kumar Sinha, ₹1 crore, Season 5, 2011
A banker from Bihar, Sinha chose a quieter route than his more famous season-mate. He opened a coaching institute in Patna that began with government job exam preparation, then found the demand shifting almost entirely toward people who wanted to get on KBC.
6. Achin and Sarthak Narula, ₹7 crore, Season 8, 2014
Achin and Sarthak NarulaX/@htshowbiz
Two brothers from Delhi, aged 28 and 23, became the only contestants to win the full ₹7 crore. They were playing to pay for their mother's cancer treatment, which Bachchan highlighted at the time. Sarthak later said his preparation for government job exams helped him on the show. The brothers now run a chain of tea cafés in the corporate sector.
7. Anamika Majumdar, ₹1 crore, Season 9, 2017
Anamika MajumdarX/@KislayOrg
A homemaker and NGO worker from Jamshedpur, Majumdar walked away before attempting the ₹7 crore question rather than risk what she'd won. She runs her own NGO, called Faith in India.
8. Himani Bundela, ₹1 crore, Season 13, 2021
Himani BundelaX/@Aleena04610309
Bundela lost much of her vision in a 2011 motorbike accident and was a primary school teacher in Agra when she became KBC's first visually impaired crorepati. She also chose not to attempt the ₹7 crore question. She has since worked toward an inclusive coaching center for differently abled students and was honored by the Uttar Pradesh chief minister.
9. Sushil Kumar, ₹5 crore, Season 5, 2011
Sushil KumarX/@amitkarn99
His is the story most associated with the show. Kumar was earning ₹6,000 a month and watched KBC at a neighbor's house because his family couldn't afford a TV. At the time of his win, he said he wanted to repair the family home and move to Delhi to prepare for civil service exams. Several outlets have since reported poor investments, scams and financial hardship in the years that followed, and Kumar has spoken publicly about how hard it was to manage sudden wealth with no experience of it.
What these nine lives show isn't a pattern. For some, the prize money became a second act. For others, it paid for one urgent need or funded a cause. And for at least one, it showed that winning a fortune and keeping it are two very different skills.
