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When you go to meet Alok Nath at his Oshiwara residence in Mumbai's Andheri West, you are greeted first by two dogs — Goatee and Daku. Goatee is a cross between a poodle and a Dalmatian and Daku is a pug with a natural black eye-patch — hence his name. Alok Nath has to quieten Goatee while Daku is content to sniff at your heels. The dogs settle down and so does Alok Nath. He sits cross-legged on a settee and ushers me to a chair.

Earlier this year Alok Nath, a man known for his gentle, strong-on-family-values, paterfamilias roles, was trending on Twitter. The social media site was awash with tweets like 'The only two wars Alok Nath has seen in his life are Haridwar and Pariwar' or 'Salman Khan is still a virgin because of Sanskar given by Alok Nath in Maine Pyar Kiya' or 'When Alok Nath was born the doctor said, 'Badhaai ho, babuji huay hain'.'

The shower of jokes and jabs left him bemused. He is not on Twitter and by his own admission, not Net savvy either — except for occasional forays into Facebook. So to what did he owe this sudden attention? Then it transpired that there was a Rajshri Pictures movie on television the previous evening where Alok Nath played his customary sanskar (values)-spewing role. 'Somebody made a pun on sanskar and that's how it started,' he says.

The way it really started for Alok Nath was when he burst into our national consciousness 28 years ago as the honest, upright freedom fighter Master Haveli Ram in the teleserial Buniyaad. Since then he has become Hindi cinema's favourite father figure, our go-to man for family values who holds a torch for tradition.

While the older generation remembers him as Haveli Ram, or as the father in movies like Maine Pyaar Kiya, Qayamat Se Qayamat Tak, Hum Aapke Hain Kaun, the new generation knows him as Babuji or some such patriarch in teleserials such as Tara, Thoda Hai, Thode ki Zaroorat Hai, Imtihaan, Astitva - Ek Prem Kahani and Piya ka Ghar and so on.

'I did a lot of introspection after the Twitter incident,' says Alok Nath. 'The sanskar jokes were coming because of the characters I play. Why is this sanskar disturbing people, I asked myself. I realised that we live in a time when too much of sweetness, love, warmth, goodness is simply not there. Today, people are used to a harsher life. So when something good comes their way, they do not know how to react to it.

'Even in the West people go to church, funerals, masses... There are 'good mornings' and 'god blesses'. They indulge in charity — all this is sanskar. Why are you ashamed of it? If you fold your hands and say pranam or namaste to somebody there is nothing to be afraid of or be shy about.'

When I tell him that maybe it's because he has become so identified with the 'babuji' characters he plays that people simply cannot separate the two, he interjects, 'Babuji is an extension of me. It is not me. That is Alok Nath doing a character. I am wearing a mask.'

It's not as if he did not struggle to avoid being perennially cast in the Babuji mould. After movies like Taal, Hum Saath-Saath Hain, Pardes and Vivah, he tried his hand at negative roles in films like Bol Radha Bol, Vinashak - Destroyer and Shadyantra.

But Alok Nath as villain simply didn't go down well with the audience. 'Neither the critics nor the audience accepted this transformation,' he says.

When you wonder if his role in Buniyaad laid the foundation for the old-man image, he says that in the period of one year that the serial lasted, he progressed from being a young man to one in his eighties. 'I think the lasting image was that of an old man, � la Gandhi, walking into the sunset. The makers believed that if they got an extension, they would pick up the thread from that point.'

For a National School of Drama (NSD) graduate it was frustrating to be so typecast, he says. 'I had other dimensions to me than being a sanskari father or a brother or a grandparent. But since the inception of me as an actor, I have got only these goody-goody roles. I am stuck with this image. Even if I want to, I can't break away as I am not offered anything else.'

Alok Nath grew up doing a lot of theatre and began playing 40-year-olds when he was in the Class VI at Delhi's Modern School. Memories of childhood are bound up with those of his grandfather, a freedom fighter, and on whom he based much of his portrayal of Haveli Ram. 'I picked from my emotional memory bag to portray Haveli Ram,' he says.

IIndeed, Alok Nath's portrayal of Haveli Ram in Buniyaad became so popular that he was a hit even across the border — in Pakistan. 'Back then we were much closer to the trauma of Partition. Buniyaad came to television in 1986. At a time when Doordarshan did not sanction more than 13 episodes, we ran for one year with 104 episodes. First it was once a week, then later twice a week. Buniyaad laid the foundation of my career,' he says.

Even before Buniyaad, Alok Nath was already working on television. 'I was part of serials such as Rajani, Yeh Jo Hai Zindagi and Nadira Babbar's Titliyan, Chhapte Chhapte and so on.'

And then Buniyaad happened, catapulting him to instant fame and eventually, an almost iconic status. 'There were no phones in rented homes in those days. When I got a call for Buniyaad, the paanwallah took the message. I distinctly remember the meeting with Ramesh Sippy, the maker of Sholay, who was to direct Buniyaad too. He said, 'We are making a serial and we want somebody with a theatre background and one who can give us a full year.' I was all eager. I am there for you, I said. The meeting lasted for hardly four minutes.'

Alok Nath admits that he was lucky to have got Master Haveli Ram's role in Buniyaad. But his first brush with luck, he says, was at the NSD in 1980 when theatreperson Dolly Thakore was auditioning for Richard Attenborough's Gandhi. 'We were about to pass out from the NSD at the time. When you are at the NSD you cannot perform outside except with prior permission or during holidays. Dolly Thakore asked the NSD to spare some students who were on the verge of finishing their course,' he recalls.

'While we auditioned, Sir Richard looked us over and like cattle we stood there for his approval. In those days we used to get Rs 60 for skits for Doordarshan. When Dolly said we would be paid Rs 20,000, I was tongue-tied (he demonstrates 'tongue-tied' and does it so well that you realise that he is a born artiste). I confidently took the Rs 10,000 advance. But the moment I came out, I separated the money in small batches and tucked it in different places, including a bag that I held close to my chest until I reached home! Dolly Thakore's advance inspired me to come to Bombay.'

Despite his NSD background and his talent, Alok Nath has not done much arthouse cinema. 'With Sudhir Mishra, I did the serial Chhapte Chhapte. I did another film with him. I did one called Trishagni with Nabendu Ghosh, and Shesh with Amit Khanna and Anita Kanwar (Buniyaad's Lajoji) which never got released.'

But television has been his medium, his lucky charm, as it were. And Alok Nath is nostalgic about the early days. 'Prithvi Theatre was the focal point where we had subsidised lunch and dinner and Irish coffee courtesy (adman) Prahlad Kakkar. Then we went to have a beer at the beach. We knew who was casting for which movie or television serial and that's how it progressed. Now we have casting directors and Bollywood has become a huge industry. Big companies have come into the picture.'

Alok Nath feels that his kind of roles have dried up in modern-day Hindi cinema. 'Nowadays you don't have family in films. If you see the parents of the hero or heroine, they are the extension of the 'Yo' generation — they are more friendly, and not pitaji or babuji. Now our cinema is an extension of Western lifestyle, fashion, food...'

Does he approve, I ask. 'I am nobody to approve or disapprove... I too have sushi, Italian food or a burger or a pizza. But basically, I am happy if you give me daal, roti, sabzi.'

He feels that television still has some traditional roles, though even there things are changing. 'Five years from now, there will be no traditional roles even in television,' he says.

So where does he see himself five years from now? 'I have done too much work for a lifetime,' he replies. 'I have done theatre, which I have enjoyed. Done a lot of television, done 450 films and I am still working...'

Today his focus is on his children — who are grown up. He would like to plough his hard-earned money into the production of movies to be made by his children, although, television remains his first love.

'Personally, I believe in the medium of television, even though the working conditions are not very conducive there. But a single telecast can make you into a household name. In cinema there is a lot of risk, especially if it not backed by an established production house.'

For now, though, Alok Nath continues to wear the 'babuji' mantle. And despite the Twitter broadsides, it's a persona that's nothing less than an institution in Indian cinema.