Actress-model Karishma Kotak rose to prominence after participating in Bigg Boss season 6. She was evicted from the show a few days before the finale. After the controversial reality show, Karishma tried her hand at hosting pre-match shows at cricket tournaments which ended up becoming her true calling. Since then, there’s been no looking back for her. Karishma has famously hosted Indian Premiere League (IPL) 2013 and 2019 Cricket World Cup.
However, it wasn’t an easy journey for Karishma, who had to face sexist behaviour when she was starting off as a presenter at sporting events. Earlier this year, Mandira Bedi, who is one of the first women to present and commentate on cricket matches, spoke out about how she was “stared down by a lot of the cricketers” when she would host pre-match shows.
Echoing a similar sentiment, Karishma said, “I feel that now it’s much better than when I started in 2011-12. But Mandira (Bedi) started before me. Shonali (Nagrani) started before me. So I felt like a couple of women had kind of set the path. They were there so it wasn’t new for another girl to be taken as an IPL host, but I think initially it was just like, ‘Glamorous dikho, chaar sawal karo and nikal jaao.’ For example, ‘What’s happening in the changing room?’ ‘How do you feel you are playing with Dhoni?’ It used to be those basic questions and I was very paranoid that I shouldn’t look like a bimbo.”
Karishma continued, “I think women get stereotyped quite quickly and I think it happens even in workplaces that we have to work extra hard to be like, ‘Oh, I’m not just an okay face. I know what I’m doing and I know what I’m saying.’ So when I did feel that way a little bit, that is when I sat down in the commentators box and I would listen to them commentating because that’s the way you learn. You get the inside information because you’re sitting down you’re watching and what you see as an audience and what you see as a commentator are two different things and I would just listen and I still do. So I think it’s much better now. I did feel that way, which is why I felt I need to up my game and now it’s been about 10-11 years and 100 tournaments later. But just going and asking for questions is not going to give you longevity. You really do need to know your game.”
When asked why we hadn’t seen her on any other reality show after Bigg Boss, Karishma said, “I love anchoring and the reality shows that have come to me like Khatron Ke Khiladi and stuff like that, it doesn’t really appeal to me, not to say I would never do it. I think when you’re starting out, you want to do everything. When I would come to Bombay and I wouldn’t see my parents for two years, because I used to think ‘ye bhi kar lo, wo bhi kar lo’. But now it’s like I want to do work that resonates with me. And I’m still up for a challenge. Like if something good came to me, I would still do it. But I think I’ve just ended up going into the world of cricket and because of that I end up doing a lot of corporate events, and lots of launches.”
Karishma is currently gearing up for the release of her movie ‘IRaH’. Produced by Sam Bhattacharjee, the film is based on the concept of artificial intelligence. The Indo-British production also features Rohit Roy, Ameet Chana, Fagun Thakrar and Rajesh Sharma in main roles.
Talking about how she landed the film, Karishma said, “It’s about hacking, and all the things that one should not do, so it’s quite interesting. The pandemic happened here around March 2020 and it was a very slow time for me workwise like everything I had planned had gone. So I remember sitting at home and I was working out at home. And then in October or November, this call came, saying, ‘We’re shooting in England.’ And I was like, ‘Oh my god, I’m so excited to be working.’ Because you miss your work like forget making money you miss working. And the great thing was it was happening in London.
“It’s very gripping. It’s very new. I think people can resonate with it. Because right now a lot of shows, even on Netflix and Amazon Prime, we’ve seen about how hacking happens and crime happens and how people can access your data and what they can do with it. So I think it’s very current, and I think the viewers will identify with it. I have a cool character. She’s from England so she’s quite similar to me. Little nerdy and a little geeky. But more than anything, I think it’s a very relevant subject,” Karishma signed off.
