Sanya Malhotra on ‘Jawan’, SRK’s feminism, and ‘The Great Indian Kitchen’ remake

Sanya Malhotra discusses her track in Atlee’s socially resonant blockbuster and fulfilling a lifelong dream of working with Shah Rukh Khan

With Dangal, Badhaai Ho and now Jawan, Sanya Malhotra has three uncontested blockbusters under her belt. This is incredible as is, and — given the diversity of her seven-year career — doubly so. Last week, a video went viral of Malhotra catching a show of Jawan at Gaiety Galaxy cinema in Mumbai, taking in the hysteria. When we meet her for this interview, she’s wrestling with her phone, trying to figure out a post on the latest collections of Jawan.

“It feels surreal,” she says happily. “When this first happened with Dangal, my debut film, I was still so new that I could not process it fully. But with this one, I am keenly aware of what is happening. I am enjoying myself.”

A lifelong Shah Rukh Khan fan — they share a Delhi University connection — Malhotra has encountered the superstar at close quarters before (“He smells so good,” she recalls her first impression from several years ago). Still, nothing prepared her for their first scene together on the sets of Atlee’s blockbuster. Khan, wrapped in bandages, his head in a bald cap, was reeling off pages of dialogue with effortless ease. They were shooting the metro heist sequence at the start of the film; Malhotra — along with Priyamani, Sanjeeta Bhattacharya, Lehar Khan and others — made up the six girls in Khan’s vigilante squad.

“All of us were surprised by how he looks good in everything... hair or no hair,” Malhotra laughs.

Later, while shooting another heist, Khan walked up to her and praised her performance in Love Hostel, the 2022 thriller he had produced under Red Chillies Entertainment. He also had some characteristic actorly wisdom to dispense. “He told me to always listen to my heart during a scene, which stayed with me. I am an overthinker and I guess he could sense it,” Malhotra says.

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Much of the euphoria around Jawan has centred on how unexpectedly political the film feels. Within the trappings of a commercial action entertainer, Atlee and co-writer S. Ramanagirivasan have managed to raise issues of farmer suicides, crony capitalism and medical corruption. Sanya’s character in the film, Eeram, is an upstanding doctor who is framed for dereliction of duty by the system. The storyline mirrors the case of Dr. Kafeel Khan in Gorakhpur, Uttar Pradesh, who was suspended over the death of 63 children and 18 adults due to a shortage of oxygen in a state-run hospital. After the film released on September 7, Dr. Khan posted a video on X (formerly Twitter) thanking the makers for highlighting his struggles.