Sexy Cop, Sexier Cop

After a brief hiatus, Chandramukhi Chautala is scorching TV screens again with FIR

In the first episode of FIR aired on Sab TV on 31 July 2006, we meet Police Sub-inspector Chandramukhi Chautala at the fictional Imaan Chowki in Rawanpur. She has a thick Haryanvi accent, wears a snug uniform that outlines her curvy frame, and is a complete spitfire. She flirts with her Brahmachari colleague Hanuman Prasad Pandey (among others) like a man. She tries to solve all the cases that come to the Chowki, cases that need not have much to do with crime and often concern matters such as divorce, love and anything else that life throws at the people who walk in. She is surrounded by sidekicks, for whom she has such tough-cop lines as: “Na ke karoo mein? Ab teen second mein thare dimaag mein maara idea na aaya, toh chauthhe second mein tera Chautha kar doongi mein.” (Now what should I do? If your brain doesn’t grasp my idea in the next three seconds, I will conduct your ‘Chautha’—the traditional fourth-day ritual of mourning after a person’s funeral—in the fourth second.)

The show got the laughs and was a runaway success. Seven years and almost 1,000 episodes later, Chandramukhi Chautala, played by Kavita Kaushik, still has her audience spellbound. She is back, though, after a gap of a few months. Earlier this year, Kavita had quit the show after 900-plus episodes to try something else (she did a show called Tota and Maina, where she plays a relatively meek character). In the interim, the FIR story took a 20 year leap, with Chandramukhi’s daughter Jwalamukhi Chautala, played by Chitrashi Rawat, taking on the tough lady cop act. But, with a new lead character, it didn’t have the same appeal. Now that the original cop is back on air, as billboards in Mumbai scream, the show’s brains trust has conveniently revoked the time leap: it was just the dream of a constable, it turns out.

The episode that marks Chandramukhi’s return has her standing on two bikes to the tune of a soundtrack that goes, ‘Papiyon ko peetne mein degree milee isse… Chandramukhi Chautala, she’s back.’ She proceeds to apprehend a biker gang in the rain as she breaks into a song and beats them all up dressed in a new uniform that is tighter—and sexier—than before. She hasn’t lost any of her chutzpah either, and her Haryanvi accent is as grungy as ever.

I meet Kavita at her home in Malad and we chat beside the swimming pool of her housing complex. She looks different from her onscreen avatar. Chandramukhi is sexy and strong, Kavita’s sexiness is softer. She is dressed in a white kurta and palazzo pants, and looks relaxed on her day off. Once she starts talking, you can see where Chandramukhi gets her charm from. “The [TV Rating Points] picked up as soon as I came in,” she says, “We got our highest ever TRP score recently—1.5. You don’t go to a Chinese restaurant to eat tandoori, right? FIR means Chandramukhi Chautala, no one else will do.”

Kavita remembers how she got the call to audition for the show. In Mumbai for an acting career after pursuing a philosophy course at Delhi University, she was doing character roles in such Balaji shows as Kahaani Ghar Ghar ki, Kutumb and Kesar when Sab TV asked her to audition for the role of a Maharashtrian female cop. “When I reached there, I told them ‘Why don’t we try something different?’ There were many Maharashtrians on TV anyway. They asked me to show them a sample. I did. And Chandramukhi Chautala was born.”

Kavita says the inspiration for the character is her father Dinesh Chandra Kaushik, who was a cop. “I actually wanted to play a cop because my father had once told me that he wanted to see me in uniform once in his life,” she says. “The whole accent, mannerisms [and so on] are copied from my dad. He is Rajasthani but worked in Delhi and used to talk to his colleagues in Haryanvi. So when I say, ‘Balakon darwaja kholo,’ I am just talking the way my dad talks at home. In the beginning, I used to improvise a lot. I would get dialogues in Hindi and I would translate them.”

It’s rare to see a female cop with that kind of clout, even rarer to see a Haryanvi female cop in a sexy uniform. Chandramukhi Chautala breaks stereotypes all the while but keeps it self-effacing and funny. “FIR works because it experimented and went against the pattern of the saas-bahu show,” she says.

In an earlier interview, Kavita had said that she made the police uniform sexy much before Salman Khan did. And sexy it is. “Have you seen the new one? It’s like stitched onto me,” she says. “But we don’t believe in showing flesh.” The uniform, and the lady in it, has got some famous fans. She laughs, “Recently, Salim [Khan] uncle called me for lunch at their home as they all love the show. Salman was there and he was watching me wolf down mutton and roti, and he was like, ‘You should work out. Dikhta hai you don’t work out.’ All I do now is eat healthy.”

She has many other male fans. Ask those who watch and chances are they would all agree that Chandramukhi checks all boxes. “Many women come up to me and say ‘My husband loves you and wants to watch your show all the time. We don’t like that’,” she says with a smile. “But Chandramukhi is not trying to be sexy. It’s a [strategic] decision to keep her like that. She is naturally sexy, but she is not the type who will flirt with your husband.”

Male attention, however, does not bother her. “I have always had a lot of it, so I can handle it. But a stalker recently came up to my building and that was unnerving. There are many who propose marriage, but I am commitment phobic yaar.”

As one might suspect, she doesn’t have many female friends in town. “In this industry, one can’t have friends,” she says, “People are jealous of your success and that’s just negative energy.”

Moving to cinema is not one of Kavita’s big aspirations. “TV is huge,” she says. “I am so proud of who I am on TV. I just ran into a fan at the mall the other day who watches my show even in the US. They wait for it. One of them started weeping on seeing me. It’s heartening.”

That doesn’t mean she will never work in films. She recently performed an item number in the upcoming remake of Zanjeer and will also appear in a movie called Democracy Pvt Ltd opposite Deepak Dobriyal.

Kavita’s fame is palpable. On her Twitter account (@Iamkavitak; 8,000 followers) people leave messages such as ‘textbook definition of d word ‘gorgeous’ 🙂 for me d only celeb in d world who matters..’ and ‘Mne toh Kk aapki DP ko apne mobile ki Background Picture m set kr rkha h…bcoz u looks very charming and lovely Ever. Love u kk.’

Despite all the male attention, she remains single. “I am very high maintenance,” she says. “I may want to stay in a tent as I trek, but it has to be a luxury tent. A guy will really have to look after me and handle my moods. But if I had to put it in one line, I want a guy who looks like he’s going to pick up an axe and cut a tree,” she laughs. Spoken like Chandramukhi Chautala.

Chandramukhi ChautalaFIRKavita Kaushik