Sridevi book: Biographer Satyarth Nayak reveals a lot

Bhubaneswar: The success of Bollywood movie ‘Mr India’ made late actress Sridevi conscious of her choices and she had started demanding stronger roles for her films, said Satyarth Nayak, who has authored a book on her titled Sridevi: The Eternal Screen Goddess.

Speaking to the audience on 12th KLF Corner, a monthly literary event at the Oxford book store here, Nayak said Sridevi had even refused to act with Amitabh Bachchan for many years, saying she would act with the top star only if the lead female character has a central role to play in the script.

Many years later, Amitabh Bachchan had to send a truckload of flowers to Sridevi on her movie set, to get her on board for the movie ‘Khuda Gawah.’

Similarly, when she was offered the role of Juhi Chawal in Darr, she refused the role saying she was better suited for the character later done by Shahrukh Khan, revealed Nayak, who was also the screenwriter of successful TV series Poros.

Better Script Choice, Poor Diet Selection

Satyarth Nayak said Sridevi managed to stay on the top despite her entry from an early age because she always chose better scripts than her counterparts in the Hindi movie industry.

“The fact that Sridevi chose to come back after a gap of 15 years for the movie English Vinglish reveals that she was waiting for a perfect script, where she could play a central role.

Despite her better decisions while signing up a movie, she sometimes chose diets that had adverse effects on her health.

“She had issues of low blood pressure and many a time she would go for salt-free diet which was suicidal for her health. She had fallen many a times in bathroom earlier also before that unfortunate event took place,” Nayak said at the KLF Corner event, where Ollywood actress Anu Choudhury participated.

The author had started working on the book Sridevi: The Eternal Screen Goddess after her death and came to know about the details from her family members and close colleagues.

Sridevi was a compassionate person and even after being successful in Bollywood, she always feared public speaking. Whenever she was approached by a political party, she had refused the offer saying she does not know what to speak to the public, said the biographer, who was born at Cuttack.

Sridevi: The Eternal Screen Goddess

KLF Corner is a monthly literary meet and is being organised by Kalinga Literature Festival  (KLF) along with the Oxford book store every month. The event started a year ago where famous post Jayanta Mohapatra was invited to recite his poems and talked about his journey as a poet.

KLF director Rashmi Ranjan Parida thanked all the stakeholders for successive organisation of the event for a year-long period and wished that the initiative would go a long mile. Debashis Samantray and Debamitra Mishra managed the event on Sunday.