Raveena Tandon: People took me seriously as an actor after Shool and Daman

Raveena Tandon’s Padma Shri honour is the second time she is this happy. The first time around, it was yet another award- the National Film Award for Best Actress for her film Daman (2001).

“It has been amazing- the kind of compliments I have been getting for it, so many friends pan political parties are saying ‘this was long overdue’ My Twitter feed is full of great wishes and compliments,” she gushes.

This honour is almost like a validation of the kind of films Tandon has chosen over the last three decades. From balancing hardcore masala films, to films that spoke about social issue, the 48-year-old handled it all. “Daman was way ahead of it’s time. We spoke about marital rape, when actually in the 1990s, the kind of films that were coming out still had a feeling of ‘mera pati mera devta hai’, the heroines would believe their husbands can do nothing wrong, however bad he is, and that they will stand by him. These were the emotions we were going through in movies those days,” she shares.

Daman changed it all. “Suddenly our film spoke about marital rape, domestic violence, which till date is relevant. Marital rape is still being debate in courts, whether it should be criminalised or not. It was a massive change from the kind of films people had been seeing,” says Tandon.

That film also led to another big shift- Tandon’s own image as an actor. Up until Daman and Shool released, she had always been known to be a beautiful face in masala films. “People took me seriously as an actor after Shool and Daman. I still remember, when Eeshwar Nivas, the director of Shool wanted to sign me, he was adamant. But the producer, Ram Gopal Varma was not sure. My image was ‘kisi Disco mein jaayein’, that image was so heavy in his mind, he said ‘when I shut my eyes, I can only see you doing Kisi Disco’!,” Tandon recalls with a chuckle

However, it was only when the actor got into her get up for the role in Shool as Manjari Pratap Singh, “When we were doing the photoshoot, he didn’t recognise me in my cotton saree and hair tied in a bun. I said ‘hello Ramu’ as he walked in, and he said a hello very styrangely. I thought ‘oh God, is he upset I am doing the film?’ Later, the minute I came and stood in front of the camera, he said ‘Oh my God Raveena, it was you?’ I said ‘I rest my case’, I was done with proving!”