When an actor writes his/her autobiography, the readers who pick up the book aren’t just regular literature lovers but also fans who want to know more about the star, or writers who need fodder to spin off stories from the revelations. And it’s for the latter that actor Neena Gupta has clearly mentioned right at the beginning of her recently released autobiography, titled Sach Kahun Toh: “The media doesn’t know me. Nobody knows the real me.”

One senses too much angst against the industry, and feels compelled to ask: ‘Why so angry?’ And Gupta shares how she’s always been presented to the public through the media gaze, just based on one event in her life. “I’m not a bold person,” she says matter-of-factly and adds, “Having a baby out of wedlock doesn’t make me ‘bold’. And that one incident doesn’t prove I’m a strong person! My biggest strength is me saying to myself, whenever I face a challenge, that I’ll fight this and move on.”

Be it the challenges in her profession or struggles in personal life, the National Award-winning actor has stated it so lucidly that it makes a reader feel as if the 66-year-old is sitting there, narrating it all herself! “So jahan meri zindagi me drama hai wahan bata diya, aur jahan nahi, wahan pe chhod diya,” she remarks.

While the world, which knows her, perceives her as a solid persona, Gupta recalls it’s her father who was indeed the stronger one and stood by her like a rock especially when she decided to give birth to her child. “What I had done to him was sin, and when I decided to stick to it, I thought my father would never support me since he was old fashioned. He came from a place where women touched feet... and here he was supporting me. I couldn’t believe! We didn’t have a relationship where we could talk about what I decided to do, but there was an understanding... Later when I brought him to Mumbai from Delhi, to live with me, I thought he would give me gaali for doing so, but I found he was happy going to the beach and joining a laughter club, which also celebrated his birthday. And that kind of life he never had in Delhi,” she shares.

Talking of Delhi, before she moved to Mumbai to pursue a career in acting, Gupta has opened a Pandora’s Box on the issue of molestation which almost every young girl goes through and yet chooses to not speak up for the fear of losing ‘the freedom to go out alone’. “Bahut kuchh hua life mein — doctor, tailor — they leave a scar on the young mind that you will not forget!”

She has, however, hidden the identities of the perpetrators as she didn’t want their children and grandchildren to read anything bad and feel bad about what happened in the past. Yet, she confesses that writing it all, courtesy the time she got during the lockdown, was like an act of purgation. And when she received the first copy of her book, while in Mukteshwar, Uttarakhand, with her husband Vivek Mehra, she says, “I was jumping! Never thought I would write it; at least I had the himmat and I’m proud that it’s done now.”