Original Coverage & Source Attribution: timesofindia.indiatimes.com
As her journey as Tulsi in Kyunki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi comes to an end, actress and politician Smriti Irani talks about reclaiming her love for acting and balancing two demanding careers.‘For years, I believed acting was a chapter I had closed’Smriti is clear that she is not shutting the doors to acting this time. She says, “My political responsibilities are a commitment I have made to public life. Acting is a craft I had stopped practising, but apparently never stopped loving. I don’t know if I would call this a comeback. I would call it a rediscovery. And this time, I don’t feel the need to shut one door merely to prove my commitment to the room I am already in.”She adds, “Life has taught me to be very careful with the word ‘never’. For years, I believed acting was a chapter I had closed. Twenty-five years after Tulsi first entered my life, I found myself standing before a camera as her again. There is a larger lesson in that – Why must one part of a person’s identity disappear for another to be authentic? I don’t know which character will come to me later. But unlike before, if something excites me creatively and I can honour its commitment, I would certainly explore it.”‘I don’t see them as two competing lives’Smriti refuses to see her two careers as competing commitments. “I have been fortunate to experience success in two demanding and unforgiving worlds. Both teach you the same lesson: yesterday’s success gives you no entitlement to tomorrow’s opportunity. Politics gave me responsibilities and an understanding of India that the young actor in me could never have imagined. And then, after many years, Tulsi came knocking again. There is something wonderfully circular about that,” she shares.
‘I don’t feel the need to choose one identity’Looking ahead, Smriti says she is focused on growth rather than labels. “At this stage of my life, I don’t feel the need to choose one identity simply to make myself easier for other people to understand. I am a political worker. I am an actor. I have been an administrator. I have known extraordinary success and I have known defeat. I have led, I have learnt, and I have started again. All of those experiences belong to the same person. Today, I don’t measure my life by how many designations I can accumulate or how frequently I appear on a screen. I ask myself simpler questions: Can I still contribute? Can I still learn? Can I walk into a new room without believing my past entitles me to a place in it? Can I still have the courage to attempt something at which I may have to prove myself all over again? If the answer is yes, I want to keep doing it. So, I don’t see myself returning from one world to another. I see myself moving forward – with everything both worlds have taught me,” she concludes.
‘Why should asking for work embarrass me?’One of the defining moments of Smriti’s return to entertainment came after her defeat in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, when she decided to pick up the phone herself and ask for acting opportunities. “I am actually very proud that I picked up that phone. Why should asking for work embarrass me? I began my professional life asking for opportunities. Why should success make me so entitled that asking for an opportunity again becomes beneath me? I have held significant responsibilities in public life, and I have also known what it is to pick up a telephone and say, ‘Is there work for me?’ I am equally comfortable owning both experiences. Position can give you authority. It should never give you entitlement. There is enormous dignity in work and enormous strength in being willing to begin again. After 2024, I could have waited for somebody to call me. I didn’t. I made the call myself. Perhaps what I reclaimed in that moment wasn’t merely acting. I reclaimed the young woman in me who never believed that starting again was something to be ashamed of. Sometimes the ability to begin again is a greater measure of confidence than the ability to remain at the top,” she elaborates.
