Manoj Bajpayee on battling Covid- 19: It was very disturbing and painful

He has fully recovered from Covid-19 now, but the road to recovery was very painful, Manoj Bajpayee tells us. The actor had been shooting for a project when he was diagnosed positive.

“I was in the middle of a shoot, Dispatch directed by Kanu Behl when a few of us showed symptoms. It’s been a tough ride. I got the infection home, me and my wife were down with all the symptoms, which were quite pronounced, while protecting our 10-year-old daughter. Our condition was worsening, I must say that we are recovering well,” he says.

The 51-year-old adds that the initial days were painful. He kept himself busy with reading scripts and responding to people, which he normally doesn’t get the time to do properly.

“I watched a few shows and films as well, that’s the life of an actor. Our daughter needs a lot of time. Mostly all of us were in separate rooms, communicating from a distance. Now she wants to a lot of play time, wants us to sit next to her while she does homework, during online classes. We are at a distance definitely. It has been a mixed bag,” says Bajpayee, who was also stuck in Uttarakhand in 2020 during the Covid lockdown.

What got him “overwhelmed” is the concern showed by members of his film fraternity, and his fans.

“I was getting messages on my phone and social media, they were enquiring throughout. I am really grateful to them. People such as (filmmakers) Neeraj Pandey and Anubhav Sinha, (actors) Abhishek Bachchan, Amitabh Bachchan ji, Anupam Kher ji, so many have been constantly in touch, monitoring my progress, almost on a day to day basis. It really touched me. I will be grateful to these guys, they were really concerned about my and my wife’s health,” says the actor.