Telly girls on Punjabi field(s)

Jasmine Singh 

The Punjabi film industry attracts something new every now and then; sometimes it is a whole bunch of new ideas, sometimes new locales and storytellers, and of late it is actresses from the Hindi television industry. Although Bollywood actresses like Juhi Chawla and Minissha Lamba have worked in Punjabi projects before, the industry is attracting a lot of actresses from television, who are being cast as leading ladies in Punjabi films. 

Kavita Kaushik, Sargun Mehta, Prachi Tehlan, Payal Rajput, Loveleen Kaur Saasan, Parul Gulati, and now Sanjeeda Ali Sheikh, Punjabi filmmakers are importing talent from Mumbai for sure! 

Demands of the role

The most popular face of TV industry, Kavita Kaushik has already worked with two popular banners of the Punjabi film industry. In one film, Vekh Baraatan Chaliyan, she played a Haryanvi girl while in the other, Nankana, she played a girl from Punjabi. Binnu Dhillon, the leading actor of Vekh Baraatan Chaliyan and also one of the producers of the film, doesn’t see dearth of talented actresses in the industry. “We were looking for an actress who could play a Haryanvi character, and who could do better than Kavita Kaushik, who played the role of Chandramukhi Chautala on the comedy series FIR. So, it was purely a role-based choice.”

Female zone

Here too the industry has taken the sexist route; while they are roping in Hindi TV actresses to play the lead, the male TV actors are cast in character roles.  

“You don’t have to be an astrologer to guess this; Punjabi film industry is largely dominated by Punjabi male singers... so why would filmmakers cast male actors from outside,” shares popular actor Kartar Cheema. 

Are they any good? 

Interestingly, barring two or three popular names, most of the television actresses cast in lead roles are regular names on the small screen. So, what purpose do these names serve? Do they add any market value to the film? Punjabi singer Amrinder Gill’s upcoming film Ashke will see TV’s most popular face Sanjeeda Ali Sheikh playing the lead. In the hit Punjabi film Angrej, Amrinder Gill worked with yet another popular TV actress, Sargun Mehta. Sargun went on to do three hit films with Amrinder — Angrej, Love Punjab and Lahoriye. 

An actor always explores boundaries, but are the pretty faces enjoying the new pasture? Actress Kavita Kaushik is slightly disillusioned, “What I am getting is not what I was offered. I was promised big things during narration, but what I get is not that.” Kavita feels the Punjabi film industry doesn’t have much for the leading ladies. Time for a change? 

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