Neena Gupta - The epitome of courage

Esha

Neena Gupta - The epitome of courage

Neena Gupta is a woman who has had her share of ups and downs, who has also inspired millions of other women in every step of her life, who has proved that she isn’t born to live in a cage of rules and regulations but to fly in the open sky full of hopes.

Neena Gupta. Illustrated by Miloni Munipally: Visual Storyteller at ThisDay

Where some actors find it embarrassing in accepting that ‘they are out of work’ or are ‘looking for some work’, Neena Gupta proudly embraced that phase of her life as well. In 2017. She posted a picture on Instagram in which she wrote, ‘I live in Mumbai and working as a good actor looking for good parts to play.’ This post went viral and became a sensation. The following year, in 2018, her film Badhaai Ho was released. This film was a huge hit and with that, she made her second comeback in the Film industry and has not stopped winning hearts since then.

If you ever feel even a little uninspired because of any reason, just take a glance at Neena Gupta’s journey for inspiration.

Neena’s personal life is just as inspiring as her professional life. The struggles in her personal life never reflected in her Professional life. Even after falling several times, she didn’t flinch, she got up and strived ever harder the next time.

In her book, Neena mentioned her first marriage to a man named Amlan Kusum Ghose. She met him during her college days and but the marriage did not last as she was a bit too ambitious and did not want to be tied down with domestic duties while Amlan wanted her to eventually settle down and focus on family.

Neena Gupta has always been a woman of her own choices and has never been scared of making the boldest choices whenever needed. Such is a story of Masaba’s (Neena Gupta’s daughter) birth.

Masaba is the daughter of Neena Gupta and a famous cricketer, Vivian Richards. It was the late 1980s when the west Indian Cricket team landed in India for a series of matches. At that time, Vivian Richards was leading the team. Neena met him at a party, there was some spark between them and it took no time for them to fall in love with each other. Marrying Richards was not an option when Neena got pregnant as he was married and had two children. Back in the day, having a child out of wedlock was not an option but Neena Gupta being the bold and courageous woman she is broke all stereotypes and gave birth to Masaba by going against the wish of her friends and family.

Who said there is an appropriate age for marriage. Neena Gupta broke this stereotype as well when she found the love of her life, a chartered accountant Vivek Mehra and got married at the age of 48 in 2008. Surely, love has no barriers.

Neena Gupta was born on 4th June 1959 in Calcutta (now Kolkata) and grew up in Karol Bagh, New Delhi. She did her elementary schooling at Bal Bharti School and secondary schooling at Vidhya Bhavan, then she went on to do a BA from Janaki Devi Mahavidyalaya. She has done her MA in Sanskrit from Delhi University. Her interest in theatres developed at the university where she met and formed a close relationship with a fellow director-actor Satish Kaushik. With the encouragement of her friend, Neena took the step forward and joined the National School of Drama. Thus, begin Neena’s journey to the film industry.

After doing tons of plays, Neena finally tried her luck in Bollywood and soon she realized that this isn’t any cakewalk. Neena Gupta was known for her popular commercial For the Hawkins Pressure which did get her some small roles in movies and television shows but still no luck in leading roles.

‘I was young and I lacked guidance’, says Neena about the choices she made during her acting journey. ‘I kept making the wrong decisions. I also needed the money, so I couldn’t afford to be picky about the roles I played.

Neena Gupta feels that the major reason she never got any lead role is one of the roles she played earlier in Saath Saath (1982) in which she played the role of a young bespectacled woman with a habit of saying, “Main na kehti thi”. In her book, Sach Kahun Toh she described the character as Lallu Ladki. Even though she got a huge fan following because of the character but to date she regrets taking up that role. Filmmaker Girish Karnad told her that she has made this image of her as a side character and now, it would be difficult for her to get the main lead role. That’s exactly what happened.