THE ONE AND ONLY

Over the course of her career, Deepika Padukone has proved her mettle, her global celebrity-dom, and her staying power right on top of the list. But behind the flashing lights of success also sits a woman with unapologetic determination...and a refreshingly grounded approach to life.

- NANDINI BHALLA

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On my way to the studio where we are to meet and photograph Deepika Padukone for Bazaar India, I have already encountered the actor a dozen times. There’s Deepika, on a billboard off Mumbai’s Worli Sea-Face, staring into the distance in contemplation, her jawline sharper than shears. Her voice comes through my Spotify account, urging me to listen to the (very catchy, admittedly) songs from her new film, Gehraiyaan. She pops up on my Instagram feed, looking impossibly glamorous in a siren-red, leather dress. And there she is again, on a gigantic poster near a stoplight, a beacon of elegance, enveloped in a tender embrace with co-star Siddhanth Chaturvedi. You can’t miss her, partly thanks to a generous promotional budget deployed by the makers of Gehraiyaan. But also because, well, it’d be almost impossible to miss the magnetism and colossal influence that comes with Ms Padukone.

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