Mandira Bedi has been one of the most versatile names in Indian entertainment. She is an impeccable actress, fashion designer, fitness enthusiast and an excellent television presenter. She is best remembered for hosting some of the most iconic shows and events, including the ICC Cricket World Cup since 2003. And recently, Mandira reminisced her older days and revealed the kind of shocking experience she faced.
In a recent interaction with The Humans of Bombay, Mandira Bedi spoke at length about the experience of hosting the epic cricket World Cup in 2003. She termed how it wasn’t easy being a woman in the panel discussion, surrounded by men who were talented legends in the cricketing world, who weren’t excited to have her around. Moreover, Mandira added how she often asked silly questions, following the brief of the television channel, making her more vulnerable. She narrated:
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“It was not easy, because they had never had a woman sitting on the panel. So, the legends sitting on the left and the right, they weren’t particularly excited about having a woman on the panel. I would ask a question, some of my questions were really silly, irrelevant, stupid, but my brief was, ‘You ask the questions that come to your mind. Whatever you have in your mind, it’s not off the table, go ahead and ask’. So, if I have those questions in my mind, then somebody at home has got similar questions in their mind. I am not supposed to represent the purist, I am supposed to represent the common person.”
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Speaking along the same lines, Mandira then mentioned how quite occasionally, the cricketers or cricket experts on the panel would stare at the camera and answer questions, without even acknowledging her presence and completely ignoring her. Facing such a behaviour, Mandira revealed how she would put her head down and start crying, and in retrospect, people around her would ignore her emotions and simply offer her a cup of coffee. In her words:
“The cricket experts would just stare at my face, and look back at the camera and start speaking about whatever they wanted to without even acknowledging what I had asked. I would put my head down and I would cry, and people sitting on my left and right would say, I will just go and get some coffee. Would you like some coffee?’ and just leave. I was just miserable and nobody said anything to me for the first one week. I was stuttering and stumbling and I was nervous, and I was not getting any support from anywhere.”
In the concluding segment of the interview, Mandira Bedi explained that despite the oddities at her work place to host the ICC World Cup, she continued doing hosting the same. Explaining the reason, she stated that the channel wanted her to bring some fun to the boring panel of cricketing legends. Thereafter, she changed her outlook and started to question more assertively, post which she too started to have some fun being the host.
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Previously, in an interaction with the Hindustan Times, Mandira Bedi opened up about getting stereotyped in her field of work based on her bold looks. The actress revealed that ever since she chopped off her hair, she has been getting type casted to perform serious, cop roles, or even sometimes of a gangster. She explained how a woman with short hair is always judged for being a bold and fearless personality. In her words:
"Ever since I cut my hair, I have mostly just been offered cop kind of roles. I have played a wonderful character in the Indian version of show 24. And then after that I got offered only cop characters. When a woman has short hair, she has to be a badass. That’s probably what the notion is. And that’s the kind of role that came my way. So instead of being stereotyped, I, as far as fiction is concerned, I’m okay to say no.”
What are your views on Mandira Bedi’s revelations?
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