If They Don’t Hate 'Vanraj' They Will Not Love 'Anupamaa', Says Sudhanshu Pandey

Launched only last month, the show Anupamaa headlined by Rupali Ganguly and Sudhanshu Pandey, has been garnering high TRPs week after week. The show marks the return of Rupali on television after seven years sabbatical from acting. This is also Sudhanshu’s daily soap debut.

About the popularity of the show, Sudhanshu says, “It is about how much connect you have with the audience. That connect can only happen when you know that your sentiments and emotions are in the right place. My personal belief is that the show is a story of a middle class family from Gujarat. And, all sorts of dynamics are there in the show in terms of the content. You see a mother, a wife, a husband, a grandmother, all the real life characters, who we see in our day to day life and somewhere or the other, everyone is connecting with some or the other character in the show.”

Sudhanshu is playing Anupamaa’s husband Vanraj in the show, who has an affair with his colleague Kavya. He says, “If people are hating Vanraj’s character that means it is the love that I am getting for my role. Because, if they don’t hate me they will not love Anupamaa so much. The simple logic is because of the way Vanraj treats Anupamaa, she gets all the love and sympathy and Vanraj gets all the hate.”

He further adds, “It is challenging when I am saying the lines, and I look at my director and tell him ‘yeh bahot jyada hai’, it is so painful to even hear those lines. But, then I get that if I do not deliver that kind of difficult language to Anupamaa, the character will not emerge the way it has. It is little difficult because I am not a man like that in real life, I am a very humble guy. But, that is the beauty of the character and that is why as an actor I am loving to play Vanraj.”

“To step into a daily soap all of a sudden is not out of impulse but definitely out of a lot of pondering and thinking. I wanted my daily soap to be something that is not a part of the rut that is there on television. I wanted it to be something that can set a precedent and make a difference. All the rating and the love from the audience is a proof of what I have always believed in, that ultimately it is the content that works,” he concludes.

Anupamaa also stars Paras Kalnawat, Aashish Mehtotra and Muskaan Bamne in key roles.