Yogita Bihani on The Kerala Story: I had the clarity about what the film is showing but I was anxious before its release

Actor Yogita Bihani calls herself “very new to the industry” but, the 27-year-old, who plays one of the central characters in The Kerala Story, has been under the limelight ever since the film released. The actor admits that even though she had clarity in her thoughts about why she took up the project, still did feel anxious ahead of its release.

“In this film, we’re talking about terrorist outfit ISIS. and we wanted women to be safe of this organisation, not any religion. When I took up the project, I had the clarity about what we are showing through the film, and how we want to keep women of all religion safe. But, before the release of the film, when there was so much going on (call for bans and people objecting to its intentions), I was a little anxious about what will happen,” confesses Bihani.

But what reinstated her confidence was the realisation that feelings like these are part and parcel of her line of work. “I told myself that I am part of an industry where you put your project out before crores of people. And everybody will have their own point of view. Everybody looks at things differently and they have different opinions. So, you cannot do anything about it,” she shares.

In one of its teasers, the makers of The Kerala Story claimed that 32,000 women had been converted [to Islam], and many forced to join a terrorist outfit. But after an ensuing uproar, the figure was changed from 32,000 to three. When asked what she has to say about the alleged misrepresentation of the facts, Bihani, whose character in the film is also seen talking about the same figures and arguing about women being forcefully converted, says: “I think that (numbers) is for makers and directors to look at. This is something the script comes with. It’s the packaging of the film — that’s how it’s presented. As an actor, you submit yourself to the script and that’s what I did.”

On the controversy around the film and the purported legitimacy or the lack of it — there is no way to be absolutely certain, feels the 27-year-old. “We have not been to that place, we have not seen that happening. So I think it is, again, a personal call for every creator and director or producer as to where they want to take their film and it is for them to decide. Even if I comment on anything like this, it wouldn’t matter. These guys know what they’re doing or how they want to take it ahead,” she tells us.

The Vikram Vedha actor also talks about her character in the film and how it was quite a challenging one. Sharing how she had to put in a lot of effort and hard work to get it right, she says, “For me, it was more about understanding where these characters are coming from and what is happening to them. So for me, it was about watching shows which were related to this, like Caliphate. I also read these books again like the Princess of Saudi Arabia and watched interviews of Malala Yousufzai. This is what went behind my research for this character. Because most of the part, where you live like a college girl is fine. But when you have to start fighting for the subject, then you need to be able to understand, imagine what the girls are going through. So with these books, series and movies, I could understand what I’m fighting for. I had the picture to it,” she ends.