Pashmina Roshan Biography

Love is a complex emotion that goes beyond what we feel on the surface. Hiding under its swoony layer are individuals reacting to it in myriad ways. The 2003 teenage-romance Ishq Vishk explored how a new, emerging generation in the post-liberalisation era engaged with love. Starring Shahid Kapoor, Amrita Rao and Shenaz Treasurywala in their Hindi film debuts, Ishq Vishk delves into the uncertainties and anxieties that accompany the feeling. Around twenty years later, Ishq Vishk Rebound speaks of a newer generation of youngsters who are stuck in the middle of situationships, casual flings initiated online, and short-lived relationships over text messages. Rohit Saraf headlines the film as a character battling these complexities. Rohit feels that social media has altered the idea of love and relationships; therefore, he says, true love hardly exists. “For me, love is a feeling of being at home, where you can feel safe, and live without any filter,” he says.

He has grown up watching rom-coms and finds it comforting to work in the genre. “Rom-com is my safe space and I like to keep returning to it,” he says. It gives him joy to watch simple love stories, and he credits Kiran Rao’s Laapataa Ladies for championing simplicity in romance. His co-star Jibraan Khan agrees and feels that love should be simple. “I see that it has become rapid these days. There is no stillness left in it,” Jibraan says. “People are running away from simplicity that was seen in our older generation. Everyone is in a hurry and I would rather want it to be simple and sweet.”

Rohit was just 7 when Ishq Vishk released, and he remembers loving the songs when he watched it some years later. It was also slice-of-life and coming-of-age films that made him want to be an actor. “Wake Up Sid is my most favourite film in that genre and it inspired me the most to take up acting seriously,” he reveals. As for Pashmina, who plays one of Rohit’s love interests in Ishq Vishk Rebound, it was her cousin brother Hrithik Roshan’s 2003 sci-fi adventure, Koi… Mil Gaya that made her fall in love with films. “The first time I felt that I wanted to be in films was when I went to the sets of Koi… Mil Gaya,” she says. “I liked being there every day and by the end of it, I didn’t want to go back home.”

Pashmina admits that being part of an influential family has simplified many things for her. “There’s no denying that coming from a film family has made things easy for me,” says the actor. She also finds it a privilege to be able to receive feedback from her brother on her craft. “Hrithik has given me plenty of life advice and his honest opinion about my work.”

When Pashmina auditioned for Ishq Vishk Rebound, she didn’t hear back from the makers for over 2-3 months. She thought that she got rejected. “But when I finally heard back from them, the feeling was dreamlike. They hadn’t yet confirmed me for the role and had just said, ‘It is looking good.’ But even that meant the world to me then,” she said.