‘Pay should be according to box office success’

Says Kajol, adding pay equality should be a natural fact of life, and not a trend

Kajol has been fearless in deciding the course of her career without bothering about the consequences of her actions or taking her gender into consideration before taking a call. The actress says pay parity is essential, but should be decided by box office success more than gender. “The debate on pay parity is a thought which has been put out. The pay should be according to genre, how the box office is and box office success,” Kajol said. “Pay equality is coming up to par. To call it a ‘trend’ would be a strange (it is) something that should be a natural fact of life,” she added.

For healthy life

Kajol made her Hindi film debut with Rahul Rawail’s Bekhudi in 1992, and was known as the most natural actress of the 1990s. She was always clear what type of roles she wanted to do, genres she wanted to explore and confident about taking a break to enjoy family time. “I keep taking a break. Every year I take a break. It is very important for my health. I cannot sum it all up in just one or two sentences. But it has been a long and fruitful journey. I am thankful for everything that God has blessed me with,” added the actress, who got her wax statue at Madame Tussauds Singapore last month.

Mommy taught me best

Looking back at her journey, she said, “I have done what I thought was right. Some of it has paid off and some were mistakes. No, I would not call it a mistake, but a learning experience. And I don’t regret one bit of it or any aspect of it.”

Was it easy to work on her own terms? “It was not easy or difficult. I didn’t think about it. Only, I did what I thought was right. I didn’t pay attention to what everybody was saying and what everybody wanted, which is exactly the way my mother has brought me up.”

Kajol confessed that lessons by her mother Tanuja helped her sail through all the ups and downs. “She was like, ‘You have to figure out whether you are okay with the consequences of your actions. If you are, then nothing else matters’. And that is exactly the way I saw it. If the film flopped or it didn’t work, I was okay with it. They were the consequences of my actions. I have that feeling drilled into me by Tanuja — The Great,” she said.

An exciting moment

For the unveiling of her wax, Kajol walked the red carpet with her daughter Nysa for the first time. “Actually seeing her all dressed up and standing next to me...was an ‘aww’ moment for me. I was happy that she was there. I wanted her to be there. It was a moment which you want to share with one piece of your life and she was the perfect person to be there with me for it.” Kajol is curently busy with Eela. She has also lent her voice to the character of Helen Parr a.k.a Elastigirl, for the Hindi version of Incredibles 2.