Suyash Panday (born 26 September 1962), better known by his stage name Chunky Panday, is an Indian actor who primarily appears in Hindi-language films.He made his acting debut in 1987 with the film Aag Hi Aag and gained recognition for his supporting role as Babban in Tezaab (1988), which earned him a Filmfare nomination for Best Supporting Actor. Throughout the late 1980s and early 1990s, Panday appeared in several successful multi-starrer films, including Paap Ki Duniya, Khatron Ke Khiladi, Vishwatma, Aankhen, and Lootere.

Chunky Panday was born as Suyash Panday on 26 September 1962 in Bombay, to Sharad Panday (1934–2004), a heart surgeon known for the 'Panday shunt' workaround for mitral valve replacement, and Snehlata Panday (1936–2011), a physician. Sharad performed India's first heart transplant.

Snehlata was a gynaecologist who opened a beauty parlour and a clinic for slimming during the 1980s, one of the first of its kind in India, some of her celebrity patients including Bollywood stars Rekha and Vinod Khanna, also authoring books and articles on the subject of weight loss. Snehlata was of Punjabi descent. She was born Snehlata Kapoor in Rawalpindi (now Punjab, Pakistan) before partition. Lt. Col. Raj Kumar Kapoor, a retired Indian Army officer turned character actor, who had launched Shah Rukh Khan with the television series Fauji (1989), was his maternal uncle.

He has one younger brother Chikki Panday, a businessman married to wellness coach, Deanne Panday.

Before entering films, he was in the same acting school as Akshay Kumar, serving as his acting instructor.

Panday debuted his acting career with the 1987 multi-starer film Aag Hi Aag opposite Neelam Kothari. Film producer Pahlaj Nihalani gave Panday his first break in 1987 by signing him up for two films, his debut film and Paap Ki Duniya. His second successful film was Paap Ki Duniya with Sunny Deol and Neelam Kothari. Subsequently, Panday appeared in many multi-hero films from 1987 to 1993. In 1988, Panday was appreciated for his supporting role in N. Chandra's film Tezaab featuring Anil Kapoor and Madhuri Dixit. Panday played the character of Babban, Munna's (Anil Kapoor) friend. For his performance in Tezaab, Panday was nominated for the Filmfare Award for Best Supporting Actor.

Since then he has appeared in many films with mixed success throughout the late 1980s and 1990s. Most of his films where he had the leading role did not fare well at the box office. In most films, he was cast in supporting roles to senior actors like Rajesh Khanna, Dharmendra, Jeetendra, Sunny Deol and Sanjay Dutt. Some of those hit films with him in second lead, are Paap Ki Duniya (1988), Khatron Ke Khiladi (1988), Ghar Ka Chiraag (1989), Nakabandi, Zahreelay (1990), Rupaye Dus Karod, Vishwatma (1992), Lootere (1993) and Aankhen (1993). His solo hit was Parda Hai Parda (1992).

The advent of the 1990s saw a new wave of actors like Aamir Khan, Salman Khan and Shah Rukh Khan taking on roles as "romantic heroes", while Akshay Kumar, Suniel Shetty and Ajay Devgan grabbed the "action hero" roles, whereas Sunny Deol, Anil Kapoor, Jackie Shroff, Govinda continued as more versatile established actors. Panday found it difficult to slot himself in either category. In addition, by the late nineties, solo-hero films were back in vogue instead of the multi-hero films in which Panday was generally cast and Panday was not seen as a marketable hero for solo hero films.^{[citation needed]}