Overview

• She says director Shantilal Joshi lost patience during a puja scene in her 1973 debut Naag Mere Saathi and slapped her after she laughed instead of crying on cue.
• When the director asked her father to strike her for a tearful take, he refused and only pretended to be angry, which made her laugh harder until she was slapped.
• The camera continued rolling as she broke into shock and tears, prompting the unit to pause production until she calmed down.
• Joshi’s account has reignited discussion about child-actor welfare practices in 1970s Bollywood, a period without formal protections for minors on set.
• After acting through 1999, she took a decade-long break following her 1997 marriage and returned with Rita in 2009 before appearing in films like The Kashmir Files and The Bengal Files.