‘Will definitely play Kajal bhai again’

How was it playing a tomboy-ish character?

The demand of the tomboy-ish character was to channelise the inner bhai attitude. I was completely clueless, but the members of the crew helped me develop the character. They taught me how to walk, talk or conduct myself with the support from the king of comedy, Ashok Saraf.

Do you feel today’s shows lack the kind of writing that the earlier shows had?

Every decade has good and bad shows and there were quite a few mediocre shows being made back then as well. Hum Paanch was different and it definitely stood out. The characters of the show were not really fictional, but were inspired from real people belonging to a particular neighbourhood and that is why the show is still loved by people, even though it is 25 years old.

Did you ever get typecast because of the role of Kajal bhai?

Thankfully not! I was doing a couple of shows at the same time and those shows depicted characters vastly different from what Kajal was.

Are you still in touch with all the actors?

I do talk to them on and off and whenever we do, we connect from where we left off. We all shared a phase where almost every small secret and even break-ups were discussed and sorted together.

If there were a Season 3 to Hum Paanch, would you like to play Kajal Mathur again?

Yes, I would definitely love to! Of course, I would need to do my homework on the character, but it wouldn’t be as hard to step into the character as it was back then.