Chhotu Singh is someone who gets special attention in the Padhye household in Mumbai. He has a wardrobe all to himself and resides in a safe corner of the home. There's also a close bond he shares with Neeva, his master Satyajit's three-year-old daughter, who sometimes listens to him more than her parents. No wonder then that he has a permanent smile on his face. Except that this face isn't made of flesh and blood. It's made of foam, as is the rest of Chhotu's body as Satyajit is a ventriloquist and Chhotu is his puppet, though in this family, he's treated like a real human being.

He belongs to a third generation of puppets because Satyajit's grandfather, YK Padhye, was one of the country's earliest ventriloquists, starting his career in 1916. YK's son, Ramdas, picked up the mantle in 1967 before passing the baton on to his offspring when the latter was just 10. Satyajit tells us that ventriloquism is thus second nature to him. "I've been doing this for 20 years, and my father taught me certain exercises that I practise to this day," he says, adding that he'll share some of those techniques at an online workshop this week. "I'll teach five or six exercises people can practise at home. And I'll tell them how ventriloquism is like learning Indian classical music, because you need daily riyaaz," he adds.