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Actress Ashnoor Kaur’s Bigg Boss 19 journey came to an end just a week before the grand finale after she resorted to physical violence against fellow contestant Tanya Mittal. During the Ticket to Finale task, Ashnoor struck Tanya with a wooden plank. Now, in an exclusive interview with SCREEN, the actress has opened up about the unfortunate incident. She also reflected on a difficult phase in her life when she struggled with body image issues.
Defending the allegations about intentionally hitting Tanya Mittal, Ashnoor Kaur said, “I tried to keep my side of the story, and I stand by it. It was not intentional. But the decision was already taken. Till the Weekend ka Vaar, I didn’t know she actually got hurt, even others never told me. They kept saying I hit her, which I hadn’t, so I wouldn’t accept that. If they once told me that she was hurt, I would have run to her and apologized. Knowing the person Tanya Mittal is, she has always made an issue out of things, and this time, she did not do so. Tanya was laughing two minutes after that. Later on, she went on with her drama. So, I genuinely felt it was drama because I didn’t think she felt the impact of it.”
She added, “The weight of the plank was too much for me to handle. My body was sore. So as soon as the task ended, of course, I was disappointed. I was upset because three people had to plot against me and get me out of the task. I threw the plank down, and in that she got hurt. I am sorry if she was injured.”
Ashnoor Kaur was evicted just a week before the grand finale of Bigg Bos 19. Talking about her unfortunate eviction from Bigg Boss 19, Ashnoor said, “I am still processing this. When I entered the house, I had my eyes on the trophy. Just one week away from the finale, and I felt like someone had snatched that dream from me and shattered it. I have not watched previous seasons, so I don’t know to what level physical violence happens. I am sad and upset that at this stage of the game, I had to be evicted.”
Pointing out how many on social media have called her eviction unfair, Ashnoor added, “At the end of the day, it’s their decision. There is nothing I can really do right now. Honestly, I was very upset. I usually don’t take medicines, but when I came out of the house, my head was aching so badly that I took a tablet. They kept me in the vanity van waiting for my parents to come, and as soon as Mom came, I burst out. We both were crying. It was an abrupt ending; nobody expected that. It was a very vulnerable moment for me. Later, the team came, and we spoke about a lot of things. But because I had my people around me, I felt safe. The house is a tough place to be in, and in the last few weeks, I had started to feel anxious. The people were toxic and negative, but I was holding on to my ground; I couldn’t allow them to break me. The moment I stepped out, it felt like a weight was lifted off my chest in some way.”
On the weekend, host Salman Khan pointed out how Ashnoor Kaur became arrogant after her father visited her in the Bigg Boss house. Sharing her views on it, Ashnoor said, “A lot of people thought I changed after the family week when my father came, but what they are not realizing is that it happened one day before when Rohit Shetty sir came for the Weekend Ka Vaar and he explained to me that I needed to be more vocal. That’s what I did. I took Rohit sir’s feedback. Then dad came, and he told me the same thing: that my personality was being perceived as my weakness, and I was actually letting things go. When dad came, I had a lot of emotional venting out, so I felt much lighter and ready for the coming weeks. I felt better emotionally, and that just recharged me.”
Sharing how the Bigg Boss 19 experience changed her, Ashnoor added, “There has been an internal journey in the Bigg Boss house. The experience I got inside the house, I couldn’t have gotten it anywhere else. It was like a concise version of life. You get to understand people and yourself. I have realized that I actually let go of small things, and I don’t pay attention to pity talks. Acceptance is very important. I have realized that it’s okay not to be okay, you cannot please everyone, and everyone is human at the end of the day. It’s fine if they are shedding tears or having hero syndrome, but that doesn’t mean you should lose yourself.”
Ashnoor Kaur found a great friend in Abhishek Bajaj on Bigg Boss 19. However, their friendship was perceived as a budding romance in the game. Clearing the rumors around it, Ashnoor said that it’s 2025, and a guy and a girl can just be friends. She added, “We are best friends, and we respect this bond that we share; it’s very precious. People these days don’t give a lot of value to platonic friendships. I understand that fans would ship us, but we know that we are friends. Some relations are such that you don’t want to tease them; you want them to stay the way they are.”
While she shared a great bond with Abhishek, Ashnoor had her guards up around Gaurav Khanna. Explaining that it wasn’t so, Ashnoor said, “I was not trying to stay at a distance from Gaurav Khanna, but a lot of times we had different points of view, and I always respected his and my individuality. Just because we were in the same group, it doesn’t mean we cannot have different opinions. It’s a game about your personality, so you should go with your brain. I would think about his suggestions, but I just wouldn’t do it since he said that. Had Gaurav told me that Tanya was hurt and I should check on her, I would have gone, but he kept saying that I had hit her, so why would I accept that?”
On Bigg Boss 19, Ashnoor Kaur faced body shaming when Tanya Mittal called her an ‘elephant’ and ‘aunty’. In one of the episodes, Ashnoor opened up about her struggle with body image issues and revealed that she would force herself to vomit and even starve for up to three days in an attempt to lose weight. Opening up about it, the actress said, “It was very important for me to open up because when you pass such remarks on national TV, forget the impact on me, think how it would affect others who are watching a celebrity being told this. I just didn’t open up about my journey because I wanted to defend myself, but also because I wanted people to know that they are not alone. Body shaming is a very sensitive topic, and it should be talked about. It was a very dark phase in my life as a teenager because I was growing up in front of the camera.”
She added, “I was kind of ashamed in that dark phase. I hope no one ever goes through that. I thought I was doing everything right, but still things were not happening. It was just that I didn’t feel it was right to speak about that until I figured out that it was an eating disorder and not something normal people do. This is not how you should lose weight. I feel that your body should not be an insecurity; it’s your home, it keeps you alive. Everybody is beautiful in their own way. Of course, you need to take care, but you also need to love yourself.”
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