It did surprise quite a lot of movie lovers when it was announced Rashmika Mandanna would not be a part of Kirak Party , the official remake of Kirrik Party (Kannada) in which she was the lead. The 21-year-old from Virajpet in Coorg has just signed her fourth film.
Rashmika is currently waiting anxiously for her debut release Chalo with Naga Shourya, a love story set between two sparring villages. After that, she will be working with Vijay Deverakonda in a film directed by Parusuram, where family conflicts will be in focusThough she is eager to see the outcome, Rashmika says she’s not a person with expectations.Just after attending the opening of her fourth film starring Darshan in Bengaluru, she shares that she never visualised stepping into the film industry. She speaks Coorgi but began learning Kannada once she signed her debut Kannada. She quips, “I don’t know a single word in Telugu. I cannot speak Kannada well too. Only through this entire process of filming, I picked up the language. Coming from a small town I felt I wouldn’t fit in but once I came to Bengaluru, the next thing I knew I had to travel to Hyderabad too! It was a big thing for me. I was studying and shooting in Bengaluru simultaneously. I came to Hyderabad only for the movie shoot; I’ve never been here before.”
Rashmika is engaged to her director and co-star Rakshit Shetty and is happy that the film industry is encouraging engaged and married women. “Women have a right to work. Why should they be stopped from working when they get married?” questions Rashmika. Rashmika agrees that Kannada films are doing well, growing in content and just not the numbers and it is changing the way people look at Kannada industry. She signs off, “I think everyone is changing and I am happy to be a part of it. I like to be a part of films that are not completely commercial, I want to see myself in some conceptual films.”
