When Swastika Mukherjee was rejected for her fair skin! – Times of India

Swastika Mukherjee who has floored all with her stellar act in ‘Qala’ feels that her fair skin has been detrimental in her acting career to some extent. During a recent interview, the powerhouse actor revealed that there were so many roles that she missed because the directors felt that her looks are not convincing enough for the part.
Swastika was told that she can’t play a girl from a village or an auto-rickshaw puller’s wife. However, she wonders why a rickshaw puller can’t have a fair-skinned wife. The actor claims these are the stereotypes we have created over the years. For the 42-year-old, characters like Urmila Manjushree in ‘Qala’ are those rare opportunities that let her push herself as an actor, even after spending more than two decades in the industry.

The versatile actor who juggles her film and OTT work with equal elan traveling between Kolkata and Mumbai also insists that artists should never be only recognized by their place of origin. Swastika, known for her headstrong onscreen characters, also takes a dig at those in the industry who calls her only as a ‘Bengali actress’ and not an ‘Indian actress’.
“Why such labels? Do we call an actor speaking in Hindi a Hindi actress? Are actors working in the Mumbai film industry identified by their places of origin? I had spoken about this in the past too. Is there any problem in referring to us as Indian actors? Why are actors from a certain region called out by the language,” She recently said in an interview with ETimes.

Often making headlines for her statements, Swastika further says that she usually does not attach importance to what trolls on social media say about her, although sometimes it becomes annoying.

Meanwhile, on the work front, the actress has two Bengali films in the pipeline – a political thriller ‘Shibpur’ and a family drama ‘Bijoyar Pore’.