NO RESERVATIONS WITH ROMANCING YOUNGER MEN: RANI MUKERJI

Rani Mukerji says neither she nor Aditya Chopra have any reservations with her romancing younger men

Actress Rani Mukerji who will be making her comeback after four years says as a Chopra bahu she has no qualms romancing younger actors nor does hubby Aditya Chopra. “I’ve romanced a lot of people. Why will Aditya Chopra have any problem with me romancing on screen? He’s married an actress, he was not blind-folded when he married me, so why would there be a problem. I have no issue romancing a younger actor,” says Rani.

The 40-year-old actress will be returning to the big screen with Hichki, a film based on a teacher with tourette syndrome where her character Naina Mathur will teach under privileged children.

She also talked about the discrimination an actress faces after she turns 30. “In the West, there has never been any discrimination. They don’t have any hichki. Yes, over here we do have that discrimination and it’ll go away if we work on it. The hichki is in everybody’s mindset. If you see an actor and go watch her film without tagging her as a ‘woman who is married or has a kid’ you will just see the character and the actress who is playing it. But if you’re going to judge the actor on the basis of what’s going on in her personal life, these distinctions will keep coming to you. You have to come to the theatre sans hichki. You have to see the actor for what is her worth in the cinema hall,” retorts Rani, who looked very happy to be back after her break.

The Mardaani actress also opened up about her decision not to let pictures of her daughter come out to the press. “It’s a collective decision. My husband being a private person wants Adira to have a normal upbringing and seeing the circumstances around her, where the parents are slightly known, there will always be intrigue as to what our child is, how our child is. There will be a kind of extra attention which probably they don’t deserve. If they are going to the school, you are hoping your child is going to be tested equally like others. You don’t want them to have extra privileges or extra importance. You want them to grow up as normal people,” she says adding, “We try, for instance if she is on a beach with her friends, or she is going to a park, she should go unnoticed, without anyone around her saying, ‘Oh! she is the daughter of so and so.’ We are trying our level best to achieve that. Of course, it is difficult because we have a culture where our fans and well-wishers want to know how the child looks, if she has my eyes, if she has straight or curly hair. But we will do what we think is best for our child and this is what we think is the best for Adira.”