The Year of Sharvari

She started working when she was 16, the high point of her apprenticeship in the Mumbai film industry being when she shadowed the filmmaker Luv Ranjan during the making of the sleeper hits Pyaar ka Punchnama 2 (2015) and Sonu ke Titu ki Sweety (2018). “I tried to learn everything I could under him, whether it was the music sessions or the casting,” says Sharvari, recalling that she would bring her books to the set to study for her Class 12 exams. Ranjan finally made her the assistant director in charge of the clap which accompanies the beginning of every scene, Sharvari adds. She got so used to being on set that she was not intimidated by the camera. Coming from a family of builders and engineers, with former Maharashtra Chief Minister Manohar Joshi being her grandfather, she was an oddity but one who decided early in her career to be an actor. She did courses at the Anupam Kher’s Actor Prepares—The School for Actors, then with a trainer from the Lee Strasberg Theatre & Film Institute, New York. Yet, it took her three years of auditions to land the role of Maya Srinivasan in Kabir Khan’s The Forgotten Army: Azaadi ke Liye (2020) for Prime Video. That was followed by her first role in cinema, in the underwhelming Bunty Aur Babli 2 (2021). But when she went to Dinesh Vijan’s office asking for a role, her luck changed. Sharvari was cast in Munjya, a horror-thriller based on a Maharashtrian folk tale. It turned out to be the sleeper hit of the year, earning `132 crore on a budget of `30 crore. She is a proud Maharashtrian, having watched a lot of Marathi TV series, films and theatre as a child. “It’s such a big part of me. I really wanted to be part of Munjya which represents my culture,” she says. That was followed by Netflix’s long delayed Maharaj and the action-packed Vedaa in theatres, and suddenly Sharvari was everywhere. The 27-year-old has now been cast with Alia Bhatt in Yash Raj Films’ female spy franchise that begins with Alpha, which she is shooting this year. Sharvari couldn’t be happier. “It doesn’t matter how long it takes to get validation. There is a lot more coming my way,” says Sharvari. We can’t wait.

Mumbai Motherland

“No one has ever questioned me about being a working mom,” says Ekta Kaul, whose career has taken off in a different trajectory after giving birth. “I remember being in harness for Jawan, and Siddharth Sir (Siddharth Anand, the director) and Shah Rukh Sir would ask me if I needed anything or needed to check on my son,” says Kaul. Kaul also played Rajkumari Kaul in Main Atal Hoon (2024). A biotechnology graduate from Pune University, the gorgeous 34-year-old was working with Nestlé when she was invited to act. She started acting in TV serials, something she loves but cannot do anymore because of the endless hours. She is now married to Sumeet Vyas, a fellow actor. “Sumeet and I take care of our child ourselves,” Kaul says of her four-year-old son, Ved. She plays Dr Farah in Tanaav Season One and Two. Farah is a complex character, who is caught between militants and security agencies, with personal and professional implications. A remake of the Netflix hit, Fauda, the series, with Sudhir Mishra as showrunner, is studded with intense actors, from Manav Vij to Rajat Kapoor, which made every day a learning experience, she says. When she returned to Srinagar, the city of her birth, she fit right in. Kaul was one of the Kashmiri Pandits who had to leave in January 1990. “We were in Jammu and there were five families staying with us, I remember them offloading their things from the trucks,” she says. Kaul goes home to Kashmir every year as she is connected to all the spiritual aspects of her homeland, something she will always carry with her.

Rewind

Watching Kareena Kapoor Khan’s deeply felt performance in The Buckingham Murders as a grieving mother who is investigating a child’s death made me wonder at this whole new series of women detectives/ policewomen who have become ubiquitous in Hindi entertainment. From Shefali Shah in Delhi Crime to Raveena Tandon in Aranyak, these hard-nosed police officers are not just excellent detectives but also wives and mothers balancing the home front. What was the earliest iteration of the policewoman/detective you remember? Perhaps Hema Malini as the vengeance-driven police officer in Andha Kanoon in 1983. The most popular? Without a doubt, Kavita Chaudhary as the IPS officer in the Doordarshan series, Udaan (1989).

About The Author

Kaveree Bamzai

Kaveree Bamzai is an author and a contributing writer with Open

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