LUCKY BREAK

Leaving India after the film bombed was not a good idea either. “I shouldn’t have let it affect me,but I did. You learn from your mistakes,” says Mehra,who is all excited about re-entering the industry with the Abhay Deol-starrer Basra. The shooting for it starts in August.

There is more in her kitty. “I will soon sign another mega project and the shooting starts mid-June,” discloses the chirpy actor.

Right now though Mehra can barely hide her excitement about Basra. “This is a film on the narcotics trade and human trafficking. It is an intense,dark and edgy film,and I play a very interesting character,” she says. The 21-year-old tells us how excited she was when she got a call from Forbidden Films,informing her that she had been selected for the part,two months after her audition. “I am not here for the glitz and glamour. I am here becaaause I am passionate about cinema,” she adds.

Mehra has been working on grooming herself in the last three years. “I was working on my self and on my Hindi;I did a self make up course,a couple of acting courses in London and also learnt yoga which helped me a lot,” says the 21-year-old,looking skyward and hoping to make her dad proud one day.

Mehra was just two years old when her dad passed away,and her recollections of that time are expectedly vague. “My brother Rohan and I had moved to Kenya to live with our grandparents. At 14,I moved to London,where I studied theatre,drama and singing. I started training very young,” she says.

Though away from India,Soniya stayed in touch with Bollywood. “It is huge in Kenya. A Hindi film would release every week and we never missed it.” She also kept visiting Mumbai to meet her mom (Kiran),who was busy completing her dad’s last film Gurudev,and made friends here. “I have grown up with Sonam (Kapoor). Anil Uncle and Sunita Aunty are my second family. I am also very close to Shraddha (Kapoor),Shazahn (Padamsee) and Prateik (Babbar),” she says. But it is actress Rekha that she really looks up to. “I simply love her. She has been a very strong support for my mom and me after dad passed away,” she states.

However,acting is not the only thing on her agenda. She wants to cut a music album,design a fashion label and also publish a book. “But all of that in a while. Right now,movies are a priority,” she says.