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The debut that broke the rejection jinx for Vidya
Actor Vidya Balan’s debut film, Pradeep Sarkar’s Parineeta, released on this day 12 years ago.
Recalling how she started her journey, the 38-year-old, now one of the most versatile actors in the industry, says that she couldn’t have asked for a better debut than Parineeta, where she starred alongside actors Saif Ali Khan and Sanjay Dutt. “Pradeep Sarkar showed faith in me when I had no faith in myself, when my faith in myself was shaky. I had gone through a lot of rejection down south and had been labelled jinxed. And here was a man who wanted to make his feature film debut with me.” Parineeta also marked Sarkar’s debut as a director, and won him the Indira Gandhi Award for Best First Film of a Director, a part of the National Film Awards.
“The film changed things for me overnight,” says Vidya. She went from strength to strength, receiving a National Film Award of her own for The Dirty Picture (2011).
About Parineeta, she says, “I remember shooting for the song Piyu Bole in Calcutta. I remember going on that little boat on the Hooghly [river]. I remember meeting Sanjay Dutt and how warm he was.”
Talking about all that has changed in Bollywood since then, Vidya says acting as a profession is now being taken seriously. “I don’t mean it in terms of the moral respect quotient; things have got more organised... which is great.”