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Actor Ankita Lokhande became a household name with her hit television show, Pavitra Rishta. But, she could have started her career as a film actor had she not had a casting couch experience early in her career. In a latest interview, Ankita opened up about her unpleasant experience with a film producer who offered to cast her in his south Indian film only if she agreed to “sleep with him.”
While speaking to Hauterrfly, Ankita shared that she had gone to meet a filmmaker in a Mumbai hotel after she got a call from him saying that she had been selected for a role. “I had given an audition, I got a call saying, ‘You have been selected.’ I was supposed to go to sign and I told them, ‘Yes, I will come to the hotel.’ I even told my mother excitedly, ‘I am going and I will get the signing amount’,” narrated Ankita.
But she was apprehensive about getting the role just like that. “When I went to the hotel, they called me in and asked my coordinator to stand outside. They said, ‘You have to compromise.’ I was just 19 at that time. At that time, it was like ‘I want to be a heroine and that phase was on.’ I played smart because I did not want to hear that I had to sleep with someone. So I asked them, ‘What kind of a compromise? Do you want me to go to a party with your producers, finances?’ So I played it very smart so that I don’t get to hear that what they were supposed to say,” the actor shared.
But, she was told, “You have to sleep with the producer.” After hearing it, Ankita got up and before leaving, told the person, “I don’t think your producer needs a talent, they need a girl to sleep with and I am not that one.”
Though she handled the situation well, that day she also decided that she wouldn’t work in the film industry and was happy with only working in the television industry.
“That day I realised this industry or anywhere, I cannot give anyone the right to any person who can ask me that I have to sleep with them. I felt so low about myself that how could someone say this to me? That day I decided, I was not going to do films. I don’t want to do films. Because I don’t give rights to anyone, it’s dirty and then I decided whatever happens, I am happy with my Television industry. After that, I got this opportunity of Pavitra Rishta and I happily did that,” Ankita revealed.
However, Ankita made her Bollywood debut in Kangana Ranaut’s 2019 film Manikarnika: The Queen of Jhansi. She also starred in Baaghi 3 and will soon be seen in Swatantra Veer Savarkar.
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