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On set, actors perfect the art of projecting different emotions on screen, but she mastered this in real life, too. Going through turmoil on the personal front, actress Deepshikha Nagpal always wore a smile when she stepped out. While she lived through a complicated childhood, Deepshika grew up to be a beautiful girl. However, she lacked the confidence she dreamt of having, with an intent to always keep her family happy, she even rejected some big film offers. Talking about this in an exclusive interview with SCREEN, Deepshikha had said, “As a child, I had no confidence at all. I couldn’t speak, and I was not being heard. Both my parents were actors, so they would keep traveling. I used to love my mom a lot, but she always pampered my sister, saying that she was small. That made me angry. I was also a kid, and being the elder child felt like a mistake. I would always try to get my mother’s attention.”
Deepshika even recalled how she was always shamed for being too skinny. “I was always reminded I was so thin and told that no one would marry me. At one point, I started to wonder why I was born, if I was so bad. From an English medium school, I was shifted to a Gujarati medium school because my mother was shooting in Gujarat. That also added to my complexity, because neither could I speak English properly, nor did I have self-confidence. I would sit at home, cook, and clean. My life only revolved around how I could please my parents. I wanted to go for Miss India, but I didn’t because I thought if I was asked a question in English and I couldn’t answer, I would become a laughing stock.”
However, like Deepshikha says, ‘God had his own plan’, and so no one could stop her from venturing onto the big screen; sadly, her inferiority complex got in the way there too. Being Vitthaldas Panchotia’s (a legend of silent films) granddaughter, Deepshikha’s mother always wanted her to be an actor. She had grown up in a filmy atmosphere, but she never wanted to step onto a set. “I used to always say, I’d rather die than become an actress,” Deepshikha recalled. She hated this profession because it never let her parents be around her.
Trying to live up to her family’s expectations, Deepshikha had decided to get married early in life and become a mother, a homemaker. “This was very important for me, because I never had a family life. My parents were never around, and I would crave having a family,” Deepshika added. It was her last-minute addition to a college fashion show that actually marked the beginning of Deepshikha’s acting career. She bagged a jewellery ad, after which people started comparing her to Parveen Babi.
“I started modelling because my father always used to say that if he had a son, he would carry the legacy forward. So I decided that I would do so,” Deepshikha shared. After one of her ramp walks, Deepshikha was offered a role in Barsaat Ki Raat in 1960. Before this, Deepshikha had also received an offer from Dev Anand. She said, “I had said no, and he kept calling, so I went and met Dev Sahab. He just asked me to do his film, so I kept a condition that he also had to sign my sister, and he agreed. So we signed Gangster.”
With a Dev Anand film, Deepshikha’s career started, and there was no looking back. At one point in her career, Anil Kapoor had offered Deepshikha a song in Laadla when she was shooting for Barsaat Ki Raat. “I was in my makeup room in Filmistaan, and he came. As a child, I was mad about Anil Kapoor; I would have his photos in my room. He came and told me I looked like Parveen Babi, then he offered me a song, and I said no. I said if I have to work with you, I will do a full film. He just said okay and left. I regret this till date.”
Around the early 90s, when Rakesh Roshan was casting for Karan Arjun, Deepshikha’s mother had taken both the sisters to meet him. He offered Deepshikha the role that Mamta Kulkarni played, and she said no. But life changed for Deepshikha Nagpal after she starred in Koyla. Revisiting her memories of working with Shah Rukh Khan, Deepshikha had recalled, “I was very nervous in the scene where I die in SRK’s arms. DDLJ had been released, and I was in love with his character. When Shah Rukh came on set, Rakeshji made me meet him and praised me, saying ‘She is a very good actress’. Shah Rukh was smoking, and he said, ‘Let’s see.’ I found that very insulting. Then we did our scene, and I got up and walked away. I would not talk to him. I was very scared of SRK.”
Sharing how they shared mutual respect for one another, Deepshikha also revealed how SRK recommended her name for Badshah, too. A film career that seemed like a perfect start hit a roadblock when Deepshikha met with a car accident. She injured her shoulder and had 27 stitches. The career met with an abrupt end when Deepshikha decided to get married even before Koyla was released. Unfortunately, the film flopped, and Deepshikha stopped getting offers. That’s when Deepshikha switched to TV and went on to play some negative roles on the small screen.
Her first marriage ended in seven years, leaving her with two kids. To fend for them, Deepshikha Nagpal agreed to play negative roles on television. But what she saw as a job only got her backlash from her family. She recalled, “I would never get respect for the negative roles. Negative roles came to me because I was typecast. I faced a lot of judgments, and nobody appreciated my work. I was told, ‘You have only stripped in this role, tum toh aise ho, tumhare bacche tumko respect nahi karenge.’ I felt ashamed. I started questioning why I ever did Koyla or Baadshah.”
“I developed so many complexes that I stopped telling anyone what I was working on. My daughter used to break Koyla CDs. All of it made me go silent—it affected me psychologically. I felt like a failure—as an actor, in my marriage, everywhere. I was broken inside. I eventually learned that there’s no market for your sorrow, so I never carried that baggage to work. Acting became my escape,” Deepshikha Nagpal added.
While her luck on the professional front was okay, marriage was something that didn’t suit Deepshikha. She met her husband while working on the show Ajnabee. Having craved for a family, Deepshikha married for the wrong reasons. She shared how her parents never had a great relationship. Deepshikha recalled, “My dad was so strict that we were not allowed to talk to anybody. When I married Jeet, I never looked at other aspects, which is why lots of things backfired. I started regretting my decision. My parents had a love-hate relationship; it was so much that I would ask them to separate and marry someone else. When I fought with my husband, I would remember that. When I was almost getting divorced, I was pregnant.”
For the children, Deepshikha continued with her first marriage, but she didn’t want her children to suffer. Deepshikha said, “You know my mother died in a train accident. That day, she fought with my father and was going to a friend’s house. Just when she was crossing the railway track at Goregaon, a fast train hit my mother. My father died in that guilt after three years. I thought I didn’t want something like this for me. So I took a bold step.”
The first divorce took such a toll on Deepshikha that she would beat her daughter to cope with it. “It was very painful. I was a very strict mother. I brought up my children by reading books. I wanted to give them the best, so I worked very hard. I faced so much emotional struggle, I would feel guilty,” Deepshikha recalled. For her kids, Deepshikha married for the second time, which lasted for four years. “It took me a long time to get back with somebody else after my first marriage failed. I used to undergo therapy, but my relationship with my children was not good; I would beat my daughter. My psychiatrist told me that the kids needed attention, so I started focusing on what they wanted. They missed a father figure, so I married Keshav,” Deepshika shared.
Today, Deepshikha has come out as a stronger person. She focuses on other aspects of life. Recently, she has also found peace in painting, while she aspires to maintain her career in the industry.
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