MUMBAI: Sonali Kulkarni has carved a niche for herself in the film industry. 

She is popular as Pooja from ‘Dil Chahta Hai’ and that unforgettable number ‘Woh Ladki Hai Kahan’. She is also known for her projects like ‘Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar’ and ‘Dr Prakash Baba Amte’. The talented actress never let the ‘Dusky Beauty’ moniker affect her outlook and in a career spanning three decades, she’s carved a veritable niche for herself. In an interview with a leading daily, she revealed whether she faced colourism in Bollywood or not. 

Sonali Kulkarni was asked how easy or difficult was it to step into the world of acting without having a godfather. To this, she said to ETimes, “I was on my own, not knowing about the industry, not knowing anything about life either. I had just taken a plunge into acting and I was suddenly doing so much work. Back then, I had no professional guidance. My family is pretty humble and in a way nice. Even today, they have no clue about the film industry as such, or about the challenges that we face. They feel that I should work with immense concentration and dedication, that is their only expectation from me till date.” 

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She added, “I think such expectations keep you grounded, but I feel every young person, especially 17-18 year-olds should be encouraged and given a certain amount of direction. They should know about saving money, about working with big directors and about managing a business. I feel quite proud of myself at times. I actually started from scratch and I feel pretty rich to be where I am today.” 

Often throughout her career she has been called a dusky beauty. She was asked if colourism affects actors. “I haven’t faced colourism in Bollywood but I have experienced it in Pune. I have only received compliments and encouraging kind words in Bollywood. More than Bollywood, I have received a huge amount of compliments when I have travelled abroad for my international films. Be it in Italy or my films representing India in a variety of other countries. But when I appeared for my first audition in Pune. I was meeting Girish Karnad for the first time and one of the girls had come with her mother. And the mother had asked me, ‘Why have you come here?’ Thankfully, I didn’t understand the sarcasm in her tone,” Sonali Kulkarni said. 

The actress further added, “I had said, ‘You know, we are all meeting Girish Karnad sir and I am here for that meeting because someone asked me to be here.’ And she asked back, ‘But have you seen your face in the mirror? Dark girls don’t look good on camera.’ I felt so embarrassed that day and I just felt like melting into the earth. But within 15-20 minutes we got to meet Girish uncle and he made me feel equal and perfectly normal as he spoke to all of us.” 

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CREDIT: ETIMES