Vidya Balan

The Most Promising Newcomer of 2005 thus echoed the sound during the Star Screen Award Balan for Parineeta. Having a very traditional Indian look in contrast to most of today's Bollywood starlets, this Tamilian from Kerala has already made her presence felt in the Hindi filmworld. Also, Parineeta earned her Filmfare Best Debut Award (2005), Zee Cine Best Female Debut (2005), IIFA Best Female Debut (2005), Stardust Superstar of Tomorrow (Female), are under Vidya's name.

Born on January 1, 1982 in a middleclass Iyer family of Palghat, situated on the border of Tamil Nadu and Kerala, Vidya was brought up in Mumbai, where she did her schooling from St Antony's School and later joined St Xavier's College, from where she graduated in sociology. When she was doing her MA from Mumbai University, she was offered a role in a Malayalam film titled Chakram with Mohanlal, one of Vidya's favourite actors. However, the project didn't materialise and vidya's dream of making it to the big screen got delayed by a couple of years. The very first break came this elegant beautys way in 1998 modelling for the Surf Excel advertisement. After that there was no looking back and Vidya appeared in more than 25 ad-films for reputed brands as Ponds, Bajaj etc. She also acted in a few music videos with Euphoria, Shubha Mudgal, Pankaj Udhas etc; besides in tele-serials Hanste Khelte and Ektaa Kapoor's Hum Paanch.

In the meantime, she also acted in Bengali movie Bhaalo Theko against Joy Sengupta, for which Vidya won the Best Actress Anand Lok Puraskar in Kolkota. But all those were just stopovers on her way to realise her Bollywood dream. It was in Mumbai during a pop concert that filmmaker Vidhu Vinod Chopra offered her the lead role his proposed movie Parineeta, that was to be directed by Pradeep Sarkar. But the verbal offer was not the final word; Vidya had to go through 40 screen tests and 17 make-up shoots before she bagged Parineeta.

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