THE CHANGE THEY WANT TO SEE

Having turned producers, several Bollywood women actors are championing female-driven narratives

- Suhani Singh

Over the course of her life, Alia Bhatt, 29, has heard her father Mahesh Bhatt impart to her much wisdom, but one nugget stayed with her. "How long are you going to fuel your own vehicle?" the producer-director once asked her. "You have to start fuelling the vehicles of others as well." So, when screenwriter Jasmeet K. Reen narrated to her a dark comedy centred around domestic violence, Bhatt heeded her father's advice. Along with her sister Shaheen, Bhatt set up Eternal Sunshine, a production company named after her favourite film, the Charlie Kaufman-written and Michel Gondry-directed cult romance, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004). Their first film, Reen's Darlings, released on Netflix on August 5. "I thought it was a great way to begin," says Bhatt. "It's the kind of narrative we want to build. We want to give new writers and directors an opportunity."