It was exactly one year after she left the shores of Australia in June 2007 to exploit her talent, she believed she had, in the dream land called Bollywood that the Sydney girl Sanghmitra saw her dreams coming true when she signed her first film in the lead role ’Bhavnao Ko Smjho’.

Although had done small roles prior to this in ‘Aamir’, Idiot Box (to be released Aug/Sept) and some TV serials Haadsa (Zee TV), CID (on Sony), Kash-ma-kash Zindagi Ki (Doordarshan), Zindagi ke Rang (Pragya channel), Sunil Pal’s Bhavnao Ko Samjho is a great leap forward considering she has been there only for about a year.

‘Bhavnao Ko Samjho’ is Laughter Challenge winner Sunil Pal’s dream project featuring a record 54 comedians from India and Pakistan, including Johnny Lever, Raju Shrivastava, Ehsaan Qureshi, Navin Prabhakar and Sunil Pal himself as well as Sanghmitra has given comic performances in shows in Sydney, the notable being Hamare Padosi.

However, it is Sanghmitra’s second innings in the tinsel town as she had been a child star in veteran Director Lekh Tandon’s ‘Kahan se kahan tak’ in the late 90’s before doing two documentaries on AIDS awareness, a few serials on DD, Telefilm on DD in which she was the only live character and featured in over two dozen educational programmes of the NCERT. In fact, with Haadsa, she was back on Zee after a gap of 12 years. All this was possible due to the training she had in the National School of Drama’s summer camps for school children. The documentaries on AIDS awareness were shown on Australian TV’s SBS channel on the World AIDS Day. Her acting talent was spotted by her mother Shradha and immediately availed the coursed offered by the National School of Drama. Her dancing abilities were exploited by her principal in Delhi Public School and she was a regular at the school functions.

In Sydney, Sanghmitra had become a familiar face after she was regularly featured in ‘Curry Culture’ programme on TVS channel and Abhinay Theatre’s plays based on short stories by Chekhov. Sanghmitra studied Drama in her Year 12 in the school and is fluent in Hindi as well as western theatre.

Sanghmitra has performed at several social functions and received standing ovation after her performance at the Republic Day celebrations function in 2006. Sanghmitra is also a trained ramp model and organized first-ever ramp modeling contest and pageant in Sydney in 2003 which was followed by Mr. India Australia 2003, a pageant for the Indian youth of Sydney.

Back in Mumbai, Sanghmitra’s journey has not been different from any other newcomer. Auditions after auditions, she braved lewd remarks and lurid advances of some producers to make a humble beginning by doing a Punjabi music album and few serials. It was during one of the auditions at Anurag Kashyap’s studio that she was offered a small but significant role in Aamir and she grabbed it with both hands. This was followed by another small but central role in ‘Idiot Box’ in which she makes all characters dance to her tune.

Sanghmitra loves challenges and is undeterred by the various auditions she does almost every day. The auditions would go very well and her talent is appreciated but somehow she couldn’t fit into the requirements. She is determined to keep exploring with the hope that she might soon fit the requirements of a challenging role that would soar her into the category of ‘fine actors’.

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