During the promotions of Mardaani 3, Rani Mukerji looked back at the very beginning of her acting journey and shared a personal story about how films entered her life almost by chance. In a conversation
with Karan Johar, Rani spoke about growing up in a Bengali household where it was assumed that her future would follow a traditional path. She revealed that working or building a career was never something her father imagined for her. Instead, the responsibility of earning was seen as something meant for her brother, while she was expected to get married early. As Rani put it, “Growing up, I think it was never really something that occurred to my dad that I’m going to go ahead in life and will work and do stuff like that. I think it was more always a boy’s responsibility. I think that responsibility, I think they saw through my brother. I think with me, it was very clear. They were wanting to get me married at a very young age. But destiny had other plans for me.” Those plans began to shift when she was offered her debut film, Raja Ki Aayegi Baaraat. Rani shared that it was her mother who gently encouraged her to take a chance on acting after a family friend, filmmaker Salim Akhtar, approached them with the offer. She recalled her mother saying, “‘You know, Salim (Akhtar) uncle is a family friend who’s offered you this thing. Why don’t you take it up and see how it goes?'” Only years later did Rani fully understand her mother’s reasoning. She admitted that she did not realise at the time that her mother may have been looking for a way to improve the family’s financial situation.
Rani explained, “I never realised that probably my mom was probably finding a way to make the financial situation in the house better. Because they knew that if I do well in this thing, maybe things would be better. But probably at that point of time, I didn’t see it from that angle.”
At the time, Rani was like many teenagers, unsure of what she wanted to do with her life and considering other career options. What stayed with her was her mother’s reassurance that acting did not have to be permanent. She said, “At that point, I just thought it was very nice of my mom to say that, try this out. If it doesn’t work out, you can go back to your studies and you can always go back to doing what you wanted to do.”
Rani Mukerji will be next seen in Mardaani 3.
