Vikas Arora attempts a fire dare on Dadagiri 4

The winner’s cheque may be in his pocket but Vikas Arora refuses to accept that the Rs 10 lakh booty was his motivation for battling it out in Dadagiri. The Delhi boy has won the fourth season of the show on UTV Bindass. “In that case I could have opted for any talent hunt where things would have been far easier,” says the 19-year-old.

The month-long endurance test was something that “log naam sunke dar jaate hain”. How tough was it? Vikas goes back to the yuckiest task. There was a wooden maze on a carrom board-like platform. On it was strewn a layer of clay, and over it chilli flakes, molten cheese, rotten eggs and hair. Ten table tennis balls were spread across the board. “We had to get the balls coated with all these things using only our mouth. Small mercy that artificial hair was used,” says Vikas.

This time, the show pitted girls against boys, touting it as a “battle of the sexes”. Two girls — Niyati Handa and Purnima Choudhry — made it to the final against Vikas. In search of the fittest competitor, they were made to spar for the challenger’s berth.

The task had a further twist — the girls had to convince one eliminated contestant from their team to perform the task along with them. This was no mean feat. “Unity among the girls broke down within days. They were thinking only about themselves,” smirks Vikas.

After much trouble, Pahwa agreed to help Niyati and Kritika gave a hand to Purnima. The helpers were chained with 10 locks and the two girls were given a bunch of keys; the one to unlock all 10 first would be the one to take on Vikas. Niyati won easily. “That made my job easy. Purnima would have been a tougher contender,” says Vikas.

The decisive task involved tearing one’s way out of a gunny bag with a knife. Then, a leap over fire to reach the site of the next task. “We had fire-proof costumes on,” assures Vikas. Then, there were five blocks of cheese to be consumed, each covered with (artificial) hair. Underneath was a key to open a chamber which contained an axe. The last stage was smashing a glass case with the axe, snatching the sword inside, crossing another line of fire and sprinting to Dada Vishal, the brutal taskmaster of the show, and planting the sword in front of him. “Niyati took three times my time,” Vikas says.

Having triumphed in the “battle of the sexes”, Vikas passes a final judgment on the girls: “Girls talk more and do less.”

The Delhi lad is not through with daring danger. His sights are now set on the next season of Khatron ke Khiladi.