I’ve been lucky that I haven’t faced racial discrimination: Nimrat Kaur

Nimrat Kaur, who shot to fame with The Lunchbox (2013), became an overnight sensation with her breakthrough role in the fourth season of American television series, Homeland. Shortly after that, she starred in another American series, Wayward Pines. Though she has her plate full with work in the West, Nimrat is yet to sign a Hollywood project.

“I do have Hollywood offers but it is a matter of what I ultimately like. There are things on the table; all I need to do is pick my roles. I only want to do roles that grab my attention,” she says.

While a lot of Bollywood actors have been heading to the West, the Airlift (2016) actor says that this isn’t a new phenomenon as is being pointed out by everyone. “Over the years, we have had actors such as Om Puri, Saeed Jaffrey and many others, who have worked in the West. We are only carrying on a legacy. It’s not like we haven’t had Indian actors working in the West earlier,” she says.

Also, with so many stories of racism against Indian actors being shared, Nimrat says that she has been fortunate to have never faced it. “I have been extremely lucky to have never faced racial discrimination in the West. I know it does exist in different forms but I haven’t faced any bias on the basis of my ethnicity or colour,” says Nimrat.

Though films will always be her mainstay, Nimrat has just completed shooting for her next project, a web series on the first woman to be trained to serve as a combatant in the armed forces. While growing up, joining the Indian army was a dream Nimrat nurtured since her father was an army officer.

“I was enamoured by the army life and I was pretty sure I would join the army. Of course, when I grew up, I realised that behind that uniform and that life, there was a lot of hard work. Working on the show has been the most physically, yet an extremely rewarding process. I’ve been training for the show since December and now, I feel like a new person. When I wore the uniform, it was not just another costume for me. It was important for me to bring a lot of integrity to the role,” she explains.