‘Have emotional connection with Chandigarh, didn’t want to buy my home elsewhere’

Bollywood actresses are now buying their own homes with no help from anyone else

Janhvi Kapoor recently bought a 3,456-square-foot triplex in the plush neighbourhoods of Juhu, which spans between the 14th and the 16th floors of a building named ‘Araya’. The Dhadak and Gunjan Saxena actress is said to have bought the house on 7 December 2020, after paying a stamp duty of `78 lakhs, which is two percent of the cost of the house. According to one of our sources, actors Amitabh Bachchan, Anil Kapoor, Ajay Devgn and Balaji Telefilms captain Ekta Kapoor will be Janhvi’s neighbours. “It was her dream house and she wanted something more than a duplex and so settled for a triplex,” adds the source.

But Janhvi, who has other projects such as the web show Ghost Stories and newly signed films such as Takht, Roohi Afzana, Dostana 2 and Good Luck Jerry, is just one of the Bollywood actresses who have purchased a house with her own moolah. Her purchase comes close on the heels of Alia

Bhatt’s `32crore purchase of her second flat, a 2,460-sq.ft. house on the fifth floor of the Vastu

Pali Hill building in Bandra, two stories below her beau Ranbir Kapoor’s abode. The first house Alia purchased is in

Juhu, one which she shares with her sister, Shaheen.

A DREAM COME TRUE

Clearly, Hindi film actresses today have come a long way as compared to their colleagues of yore. In addition to calling the shots regarding their work, they’ve being getting paid better and even are choosing their abode and making it a home, all on their own.

But it hasn’t been easy for the girls to step out of the parents’ nest and build their own. For these actresses, such buys are nothing less than a dream-come-true, which leaves them with a lump in their throat on seeing the fruits of their own labour. Taapsee Pannu, another Bollywood belle who bought a house in Mumbai some time ago, reminisces about that feeling of independence. “I’d left for the shoot of Manmarziyaan from my old apartment, which I had taken on rent since I moved to Mumbai. But when I got back from the shoot, I entered my new apartment, which I had got ready with all the interior works completed. It was like a new chapter began in my life — just like that,” she says, adding that it further transformed into a home when her family moved in it, too.

HOME IS WHERE THE HEART IS

Yami Gautam, another actress who recently bought an abode of her own, is among the tribe who prefers to work in Mumbai but buy their homes closer to where their heart yearns to settle down. The actress’s home is a duplex apartment, which she bought last year in Chandigarh. The actress had even moved in there during the lockdown and has been working from there since. “I have an emotional connection there and I didn’t want to buy my home elsewhere,” she explains.

Incidentally, Yami, who made Mumbai her home after her debut film Vicky Donor, has already got a place in Himachal Pradesh, which is a 100-year-old heritage home.

Surely, for these actresses, the phrase ‘settling down’ has a meaning completely unlike the patriarchal connotations of ‘getting married’.

Clearly, Hindi film actresses today have come a long way as compared to their colleagues of yore. In addition to calling the shots regarding their work, they’ve being getting paid better and are choosing their abode and making it a home, all on their own.

My dream house transformed into a home when my family moved in it, too.

— TAAPSEE PANNU, actress

“I have an emotional connection with Chandigarh and I didn’t want to buy my home elsewhere”

— YAMI GAUTAM, actress