EP-454 | Nimrat Kaur on Losing Her Father to Terrorism, Military Life, Dhurandhar & Bollywood

ANI Podcast with Smita Prakash

Actor Nimrat Kaur discusses her unconventional career trajectory, moving from the global success of The Lunchbox to international roles in H

Key takeaways

• Nimrat's career gap after The Lunchbox was due to filming commitments for Homeland and Airlift rather than intentional selectivity.
• She actively resisted being typecast as a 'trapped housewife' following her breakout role.

Main topics

• Acting career and typecasting
• Personal tragedy and terrorism in Kashmir

Notable quotes

I don't present anything false in any part of my life.

Conclusion

A poignant interview that balances the glamour of international cinema

Transcript preview

Speaker 1 (0:00) Namaste, Jai Hind. You're watching or listening to another edition of the NI podcast with Smita Prakash. This episode is being filmed in Mumbai and my guest today is Nimrat Kaur. She's an actor known for her powerful performances in The Lunchbox, Airlift, Dasvi, Homeland and The Family Man. From Indian cinema to international television, she has built an unconventional career defined by strong, complex characters. Today, she's one of India's finest but has consciously let her performances speak rather than publicity. Nimrit called first won hearts around the world with her deeply moving performance opposite Irrfan Khan in The Lunchbox, a film that became an international success and established her as a performer of remarkable subtlety. She went on to make her mark in both Indian and international projects, probably because of her unconventional beauty and subtle sense of style and sensitive portrayals. In the industry, she has a reputation for choosing quality over quantity. Nimrath has also built a career defined by restraint. Her interviews are also similar. Speaker 1 (1:13) Thank you, Nimrat, for coming on the show. I'm so happy to have you. It's my pleasure. And for viewers and listeners, I have your permission to use your first name. Not that you needed it, but yes, sure, please. Okay, so I have to ask you, you became the sweetheart for everybody with the lunchbox. So we will get to that. I'm sure every interview you're asked about that. And you certainly don't look anything like... what I had what my view about you was you look super glamorous and super beautiful and you're all this understated under glamorized look in lunchbox that you have but yeah let me get to first you know when lunchbox happened to you everybody thought like you've arrived like a Shabana Azmi or a Smita Patil and you're going to be signing this you know, a movie a week and we're going to be seeing so much more of you but you were very selective after Lunchbox in the sense that it was staggered growth for a few years. Was that a conscious choice you made in taking only quality projects? Speaker 2 (2:20) No, actually, you know, on the contrary, what happened was that the Lunchbox happened Speaker 2 (2:30) Absolutely out of plan. You know that was not in the syllabus. I was astounded by what happened with that film. We premiered in Cannes. It released in some 75 countries. I was actually touring with the film for many months after that worldwide. So that went on for quite some time and immediately after that I was cast in Homeland. which took me away for about six to eight months of filming after which I came back and then I did Airlift Speaker 1 (3:03) which Speaker 2 (3:03) took another year to film. So the gap you're talking about is actually me filming Homeland and filming Airlift. Speaker 1 (3:10) Okay. You Speaker 2 (3:10) see. So those are Speaker 1 (3:11) technical reasons. Speaker 2 (3:12) Just like you know life reasons. It's not something you plan. It's not something I could have you know designed in a lifetime or maybe nine lifetimes. I don't know. You know but it was just something that I was just witnessing happening to me to be very honest. The Lunchbox was a film with a beautiful script and phenomenal actors. I was just happy to be cast in it. As a newcomer, you know, there was no expectation of where your career is going to go or what's going to happen. There was no plan. It just happened. So after that, everything just happened to me for quite some time. and I just Speaker 1 (3:50) went with it. Speaker 2 (3:51) So I can tell you my timeline. What kept happening and how things and how projects came to me and what I took up when and what took a little more time. I feel like in that part of my life filming of things took a little bit longer and releases took a little bit longer for me. That necessarily is not the case with everyone. But the kind of projects also that came to me were phenomenal. So I think they just came with Speaker 1 (4:20) their own process which I was just following. How did Homeland happen to you in the sense that how did international cinema come to you at that stage? Honestly, they just saw the Speaker 2 (4:29) lunchbox because it released everywhere. And I do believe that another actor was cast for that part. But then they saw it and... Very famously the writers and directors and the creators of Homeland they were like you know we saw you in the lunchbox and we thought you make a great spy. So Speaker 1 (4:50) I said you thought that Ela trapped in that house in that Speaker 2 (4:54) kitchen sweaty making food and you know barely even getting her you know hair tied in the right way would make a great spy. They said yeah we saw it. It was just... perfect for us you know something about it so that's how it happened and then it was Speaker 1 (5:09) spy after spy after spy Speaker 2 (5:10) it was after that it was just you know like over the last few years you know what happens is with that is that I think when people see something work then they want to repeat that You know, and then they enjoy that. And honestly, I enjoy it sometimes as well. It just depends on what kind of a canvas it is. But so Homeland literally was, you know, just Providence. Speaker 1 (5:30) Surprisingly, the lunchbox which brought you into focus, that look didn't come back again and you didn't get typecast with that look. I fought tooth and nail. That is not Speaker 2 (5:44) a fluke. Because I tried my level best. believe you me, 10-15 projects must have come to me, you know, like, you know, a trapped housewife, someone who wants to get out of a marriage, someone who's unhappy in it, this, that, the other. So I actually made sure that is what, if there was a delay in some projects, you know, being visible and things because I was just holding out and I was like, I'm not going to keep repeating what I've just done and something that is, you know, so beautifully You know, it's just up there and why would you want to touch a space like that and play the same thing again? So I tried my level best and to date. Speaker 1 (6:25) You Speaker 2 (6:25) know, there are some times that, you know, if I even so much as get a whiff that this is going in that space. Ila again. Ila again. Or, you know, bored, sad, lonely housewife again. No, thanks. Speaker 1 (6:37) Okay, tell me, what was the brief given to you at that stage? And it was so outside your character in the sense, you are an exuberant. person, suppose like, you know, that that's completely different. Yeah. So when that brief was given to you, uh, how did you prepare for it in for lunchbox? Speaker 2 (6:54) Wow! That was actually a great process. I Speaker 1 (6:57) enjoyed Speaker 2 (6:57) it a Speaker 1 (6:58) lot Speaker 2 (6:58) that time because you know I was doing theatre at that time in Bombay and I had all the time to prepare for that film. I was doing no other film so I actually sat with the script for a long time and I physically also changed myself a lot you know I put on a bit of weight not that I was asked to I just wanted to do it. I just stopped looking after myself you know all the salon kind of preening and looking you know like the vanity part of life I let go off for a few months. I just wanted to really experience what it might be like. I may not be able to do that again. No time for self-care. No time for self-care or no concept of self-care. Self-care wasn't even a concept that you know people spoke about. I'm talking about you know just a decade back. Seems a generation away. It seems Speaker 1 (7:40) like a lifetime ago. But what Speaker 2 (7:42) I did was that I genuinely wanted to experience her isolation and her quietness and the softness and the naivety that you know she she she's such a soft sweet and a simple person who just lives in her bubble and eventually just breaks away you don't expect her to do that I've seen people like that growing up so you know I've grown up in small cities in my paternal side lives in a village so it's not like I'm not exposed to environments where women live in different environments and you know different I think different spaces where education is not very accessible etc. So I've seen all kinds of women growing up. So I had an idea in mind, I didn't know anyone in particular who was like that but I had an idea in mind which I wanted to bring to life with that. So the process really was that I experimented a lot in my mind and thought about how you know best to construct her and make her very softly believable not an aggressive kind of a preparation which also shows I think sometimes Speaker 1 (8:47) so Speaker 2 (8:48) it was just that it was just very simple and we filmed sorry no go ahead we filmed my story in nine days so eventually what you see really? so fast fast read read like That, there was no hair and makeup, you know, I would just tie my hair up. I had put some mehendi on my nails to, you know, give the hands a little character because I knew that there will be a lot of food shots, hand shots, Speaker 1 (9:10) you Speaker 2 (9:10) know, all of that. I set the kitchen up, you know, along with the art director. As per how, like you know how you are in your kitchen. Even if you're blindfolded, you can reach out. You know what you need. Speaker 1 (9:22) So Speaker 2 (9:22) I had that comfort in the spaces that we shot in. We shot in a small apartment in Malad. Speaker 1 (9:27) So Speaker 2 (9:28) it was just very true to life for that process and it was just really good. Speaker 1 (9:32) So does Nimrit visit Ila often? Speaker 2 (9:35) Never. Speaker 1 (9:36) She's put her in a bundabba. I Speaker 2 (9:37) mean it exists here, no? Speaker 1 (9:39) It's the Speaker 2 (9:40) most beautiful way to experience it because everyone, I experience my work through the feedback you get or through people coming up to me and telling me that hey we saw this and we loved it and oh we remember you here. So that is my favorite way of experiencing something I've done. I never re-watch something. No but in the sense Speaker 1 (10:00) that you've played a character and you've lived a her life in that period of time. Yeah. Right? So sometimes when you are in a quiet space, do you learn something from that experience? I think I learn more from people around Speaker 2 (10:15) me. Speaker 1 (10:15) Okay. Speaker 2 (10:16) Rather than something that has come from my own mind and I have created basis, a script I got at that time. That time is gone. That... Moment is gone. I have lived it to the fullest. It's, you know, immortal on cellulite. And now it's done. It's for people to, you know, relish, enjoy and hopefully remember. And with the lunchbox, it, you know, it has become really the greatest gift in that sense. What was he like, Irfan? I wish I could have had a long answer for this because I don't know him personally. I didn't know him personally. I didn't know him professionally before that. We met literally, you know, once on a reading and on set. even by chance because he was shooting something in the same location as I had to. Speaker 1 (10:57) Yeah, because you hardly have scenes together, right? No scenes, Speaker 2 (11:00) that's true. We have no work. It's just that one cafe where he's looking at me and I'm oblivious that he's there. I'm waiting for him. That's it. What a Speaker 1 (11:10) love story. What a love story. Speaker 2 (11:11) I'm requited, Speaker 1 (11:12) no? Please tell me, did they meet at all in Bhutan? I believe Speaker 2 (11:15) they met. I am a hardcore romantic. I am a Pisces girl. If you have it, I will never have any other ending. They always met. They had a cafe in Bhutan. Okay. Speaker 1 (11:26) I can set that at rest in my mind at least. Because these incomplete endings, they leave me with this sense of... Anxiety. Anxiety. Right? It happened or not? It happened. Speaker 2 (11:38) They met. They had a happily ever lived ever after. Whatever you Speaker 1 (11:42) say. But, you know, haters will say, no. You know. You can't. No. They never met. Whatever. Whoever. Speaker 2 (11:49) Whatever. I think they met. I think they had... beautiful life after that. Speaker 1 (11:54) Yeah, but have women come up to you and spoken and said that, you know, we felt trapped in relationships, not necessarily marriage, sometimes toxic relationships or whatever semi-toxic relationships happen even with your children, parents, siblings. These are lived experiences. Do they come and tell you that, you know, you emoted that feeling for us? Yeah, Speaker 2 (12:18) I think. The loneliness, that is something that even though on paper you have a family but that doesn't mean that you know you're loved or you feel warm in your own home that you've created and you maintain and you know you work so hard to keep going from day to day. So women told me that a lot. They said that we could sense you know something being portrayed on camera that on film that we could relate to. They said that you know the loneliness of being a housewife. we've never seen, you know, the quiet solitude you face and feel, which is not necessarily great for everyone. Speaker 1 (12:55) Because Speaker 2 (12:56) one has a family so that you feel loved, you feel like you have company, you feel like, you know, you feel a part of a structure you've created. So not everyone feels that. And most people don't actually. People think a family is the answer to, you know, feeling complete. So Speaker 1 (13:15) they, a lot of women told me that. Told you that. I have to come to your family in the sense that your father was killed in action while fighting terrorism. He was given the Shoray Chakra posthumously. You've spoken about it many times, but today I'm talking to you about your mother. As a single woman who brought up two girls, tell me about her strength and her resilience. Because we know about heroes. who give up their lives for the country. The services train those men to know that this will happen. Nobody trains the families to be ready for that foreseeable future. Tell me about your mother. Speaker 2 (13:59) So my mum was very young when my father, we lost him in Kashmir. My mum was like literally in her. early to mid 30s. So she, the world she knew collapsed. You know, we were just two young girls she was bringing up. And we had family around us to support us at the time, my maternal side. But having said that, the life we knew was over, you know. So it was really, really traumatic for her. And I think The reason why she went on and why she found the courage to bring herself together was because she recognised that here are these two kids and they have an entire life. I think that's what gave her the courage and I think somewhere a reason. Because nothing prepares you for that. for my father in the way he went, nothing can prepare you for that. And I know from the conversations we know of that happened before he was shot, he told them that, you know, I have a family, I have two girls. I know that he was thinking of us in his last thoughts. That was all that I think he would have wanted to come back to. And for my mum, you know, it was a day after day kind of a... Speaker 2 (15:30) It was very difficult. Where were you posted then? We were in Kashmir. Papa was posted in Kashmir. That being a field posting, we were not there. We were in Patiala. So I was studying in YPS Patiala actually. And my sister and I, we were there. So we were with him in Kashmir when the incident happened. And then after that we went to Noida because my mum's parents were there. My nan and aunty were there. What happened in Speaker 1 (15:57) Kashmir? Can you tell me about the incident? Speaker 2 (15:59) When your father Speaker 1 (16:00) passed? When he was attacked and killed? Speaker 2 (16:03) Well, it was... He was actually kidnapped from a normal day of work. He was going to... He was going somewhere for a duty that he had been assigned. And then on his way back, he was kidnapped by... people who postured as soldiers. So they were wearing army fatigues and he was taken away. And then there were some ridiculous demands. There were those terrorists, you know, they demanded for release of other people, you know, who were in captivity in India. And other ridiculous demands that came up over a period of seven days. So we were moved from Verinag where my mom and my sister and I were there at the time. We were visiting my father. And we were moved to Srinagar because it was no longer safe to stay there within that week. And on the seventh day, we got news that he had been assassinated. So after that, we came to Noida. So that's where we... Speaker 1 (17:07) How did it shape you because you were just 11 right? I mean you don't understand what is terrorism I guess you're just living in the condo you have friends you're going to school and then if you're in a non-family after that you have you have the support structure of of so many people and then suddenly life changes and it changes forever right you a violent death of a there's no closure I'm guessing? Speaker 2 (17:35) No there isn't any I mean I saw my father leave for work that morning and I just remember him leaving and then after that the next thing the next time I saw him was in a coffin so there is no closure there of course but you know it's a strange feeling even after all these years because Speaker 2 (17:58) technically you feel like it's been so long. It's been a few decades but nothing quite I think repairs that. Speaker 1 (18:08) Not Speaker 2 (18:09) for my mom, not for my sister, not for me and Speaker 1 (18:12) not for the rest of the family. Like last year when the terror incident happened in Kashmir. When that happens it was similar kind and similar in the sense that then it was civilians last year who were just shot but I'm sure for you yeah you felt it at that stage like any of these attacks which happen in some way it must seem more raw and more painful than for you know anybody else because you understand you empathize that kind of sentiment would that yeah I Speaker 2 (18:48) think I understand the gravity of the loss You know, I feel like because when you've gone through something so dense as a child, you know exactly the cycles the family will go through, you know, Speaker 1 (19:01) how Speaker 2 (19:01) they're going to live from day to day, what I saw my mother go through, what I personally went through, my sister went through. It's something you recognize very closely. And