Sarika, the actress who is well known for a lot of things. First and foremost, a child prodigy. Then came the titles of Kamal Hassan’s wife, Shruti Hassan’s daughter, a rebel, etc. Since childhood, Sarika had been brought up in the North. Dabbling in Bollywood since the age where normal kids went to school, Sarika went to try her luck in the film industry.
Due to her parent’s broken marriage, Sarika had been forced to be the one to bring home food and dough to sustain her family. She has accompanied her mother to all her shoots since then. She bagged roles with the most famous celebrities of the time. She was an ardent self-learner. Lacking a formal education, a tutor had been teaching Sarika to read and write. After realising, that the tutor repeated the same lessons over and over again, she started teaching herself with newer and advanced literature eventually making reading a hobby. There were always gossips about her mother being possessive and abusing her. She was beaten and abused by her mother on the slightest of errors. Her mother decided her roles, career paths, and other life decisions.
At 21, Sarika decided that she had enough of this life and ran away from her house. She ran without clothes, make-up, money. The first 6 days were spent in a car and on borrowed clothes, showers, and food provided by friends. It was after these days that she realised that she had 6 apartments to her name and could continue her career without her mother.
After quite some time, she met and fell in love with the renowned actor, Kamal Hassan.
They had two daughters before their marriage. It was only after the birth of Akshara Hassan that the couple got married. In 2004, their marriage unexpectedly came to an end after 17 complete years. Rumours say that it was due to Kamal’s affairs with Gauthami and other women. Once again, she had no assets to sustain her life, and ironically once again the film industry was what helped her.
She started auditioning for new acting roles when one of the roles bagged her the National Award for Best Actress. Recently, her mother struck her name off her will and gave all assets to a doctor instead. Actor Aamir Khan had intervened and helped at the time. Finally, Sarika decided to give up on her stardom and stay low-profile, gave up on make-up, and adorned simple and elegant kurtas. Unlike her mother, she supported her daughters in their careers and their lives. She has fought every problem life threw at her with pure elegance. Hope she continues to do so gracefully.
