Sanvikaa, Panchayat’s Rinki: ‘Parents have stopped sending employment news links now’

Born in Madhya Pradesh’s Jabalpur, Sanvikaa completed her engineering from there and then moved to Bengaluru, However, an engineering job was never her goal. “I told my parents I am moving to Bengaluru for a job. But actually, I lied to them (laughs). A 9 to 5 job was never my goal. I had kept my options open. And after a few months I shifted to Mumbai and became an assistant director (costume). It was during the shootings of some ad films I thought of trying my hand in acting and started giving auditions. Luckily, I cracked some auditions and got acting chances in ad films,” Sanvikaa told indianexpress.com.

However, back home parents still wanted her to have a stable job. “They used to keep sending me job ads and employment news links and wanted me to apply for them. Thankfully they didn’t ask me to get married as they gave me freedom to have a career,” said the actor.

Elaborating on the circumstances when she was offered Panchayat, Sanvikaa said, “I had gone for an audition of an ad film and there a man came to me and asked me to do a screen test for a small character in TVF. I didn’t know it was for Panchayat. Since it was for TVF, I was excited because I just wanted to get into the database of Casting Bay (casting company for TVF). Thankfully I got the role. I was told in the first season I will have a small role in the end and then the character will be extended in the second season.”

Being from Jabalpur, and having stayed in villages in childhood helped Sanvikaa prepare for the character. “My childhood experience of staying in a village was a blessing for me. I have been in that world so I could easily get into the character,” said the actor, adding that the only challenge was to perform in front of National Award-winning actors like Raghubir Yadav and Neena Gupta.

“I was very nervous initially as TVF had shown trust in me. What if I couldn’t meet the expectations? Then I had to perform with Neena ji and Ragubhir sir. So it was difficult. However, they were very supportive. They used to give creative inputs to enhance my performance. They treated me like a family,” said Sanvikaa, adding she is desperately waiting for the third season of Panchayat.

On being asked how the reaction was back home after the success of Panchayat and if they are getting wedding proposals for her, Sanvikaa said, “They all are very happy and now they have stopped sending me job posts. I am sure they must be getting wedding proposals for me. But I know they would cancel at that stage now (laughs).”