‘Ajay Devgn was my Biggest Support after I was termed Scarface’: Mahima Chaudhry
Actress Mahima Chaudhry spoke about how Ajay Devgan was a huge support during the filming of Dil Kya Kare after she was involved in an accident that left her face scarred.
Mahima Chaudhry has been absent from the big screen for a long time. However, there was a time when the actress had given up hope of pursuing a career in the film industry. Mahima was involved in an accident while filming Prakash Jha’s directorial Dil Kya Kare, which also starred Kajol and Ajay Devgn. Mahima’s face was scarred from the accident.
“It was the final day of shooting in Bangalore. A shoot in the early morning hours. I sat in the back seat of the car. A milk truck was coming from the wrong direction and collided with my car. “The glass pieces came like bullets into my face,” Mahima recalled of the accident, adding that she “had no hope” of ever returning to the film industry. “I was bracing myself for a life without cinema. I was figuring out how to deal with it (the accident).Anything that happened post that was just God’s gift,” she told Bollywood Bubble in an interview recently.
Mahima recalled how the media reacted to her accident, saying, “When I had my accident, they came on the sets when nobody was allowed.” Because I still had scars, they took a shot from a distance. They put a picture of me on the cover of a magazine and wrote, ‘Mahima had an accident.’ She has scars all over her face. We can actually refer to her as Scarface.’ It still bothers me. How vile are you capable of being? I was recuperating.I never thought my face could look normal,” she says, adding that Ajay Devgn was the one who tried to normalise the situation for her. “Ajay said, ‘I get scars like this all the time.’ He was an extremely generous producer. He looked after me,” she explained.
“I was doing a guest appearance in another film with Ajay. I gently informed the director that I would only shoot in long shots. I was hiding the left side of my face on set because the scars were visible. The camera was getting closer and closer to the director. It’s one of those experiences that sticks with you. Ajay looked at me and asked, ‘Are you not prepared?’ He told the director to leave it alone and said, ‘Let’s not do this, give her time.’ He told the director, “I’m still not over the accident.”
Mahima stated that it took her a long time to recover from her accident. Her career, however, did not end there, as she went on to appear in several films following the accident, which she describes as “God’s gift.”
