Mumbai, September 17, 2026 (Yes Punjab News)
Actress Rasika Dugal has reflected on her professional journey, struggles and the phase in her career when she began receiving wider recognition, saying the period after 2016 marked a significant shift in the kind of work coming her way.
Dugal spoke about her career during an appearance on Neha Dhupia and Angad Bedi’s ‘Double Date’. During the conversation, Neha praised the actress’ distinctive body of work, telling her, “Rasika, you have become a genre and it is amazing.”
Asked when she truly felt that she had become a part of the industry, Dugal pointed to the period when her work became more consistent.
“From the time work became more continuous, it was between 2016-17. I moved from FTII in 2006, so it was a good 10 years later,” she said.
Dugal noted that she had continued to get projects in the intervening years that encouraged her and kept her going, but said those projects did not receive the same level of visibility as her later work.
She recalled films such as ‘Kshay’ and ‘Qissa’ among the projects that came before this phase, giving her opportunities to work with established talent.
According to Dugal, things changed after 2016, when projects including ‘Manto’, ‘Mirzapur’ and ‘Delhi Crime’ began coming one after another. She attributed part of this shift to the emergence and growth of streaming platforms.
“It was after 2016 that work like Manto, Mirzapur and Delhi Crime, and a couple of other works, started happening back to back. And largely because streaming platforms started coming out. Then I felt something like that it was a movement,” she said.
Dugal most recently featured in ‘Mirzapur: The Movie’, directed by Gurmmeet Singh and presented by Amazon MGM Studios in collaboration with Excel Entertainment.
The film is backed by Ritesh Sidhwani and Farhan Akhtar under the Excel Entertainment banner and co-produced by Kassim Jagmagia and Vishal Ramchandani.
The movie brings back several familiar actors from the series, including Pankaj Tripathi, Ali Fazal, Divyenndu, Shweta Tripathi, Shriya Pilgaonkar and Harshita Gaur, alongside Dugal. Jitendra Kumar and Ravi Kishan are among the new additions to the cast.
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