There is no denying that Vikas Gupta, one of the three finalists this season is as popular as the winner, Shilpa Shinde. Known as the mastermind inside the house thanks to his brilliant strategies, the producer seems extremely happy with the way his journey has shaped up. We caught up with him for a quick chat on everything that's been happening in his life. Dressed in white from head to toe, welcoming us with a huge grin on his face, he starts off his conversation by thanking us. "I saw an article on your website about me, and I want to thank you. It said good things about me without being mean to anyone else," he stated. This bit, being kind without putting the other person down, seemed to be a huge part of his journey on Bigg Boss too. When we question him about his mastermind strategies, he says, "The first thing that comes to my mind during a task is that I don't want to hurt anyone. I cannot base my win on someone's loss. I feel that karma is very strong and if you hurt people to get something that you want, it never stays with you. If you see my last task, Vikas City, I tried my best to torture people without hurting them. People were talking about the fact that I used my mother's photo and asked Hina to walk over it but the point is I did not use her mother's picture because I did not want to hurt her. This was my task, I had to win the money and I wasn't ready to hurt them to win."
The conversation moves on to his equation with Shilpa. He has had a tough five weeks inside the house (he even tried to escape thrice) when Shilpa turned against him, accusing him of having a hand in throwing her out of her hit serial Bhabi Ji, and ensuring that she got no work in the industry for over an year. "I have always maintained that I admired Shilpa's journey. Honestly, mid-season I knew that she was winning it. She managed to turn her image around with her "maa" avatar and even her equation with me was great. Her journey has in fact taught me a lot about how to play the game." He goes on to add that while he admires her, she also made it extremely tough for him to survive. "During the initial months when people sided with Shilpa while she tortured me, I started feeling very lonely and unwanted. That was when I wanted to get out," he shared, probably referencing why he tried to escape from the house several times.
Talking about the other strong contestant, Hina, Vikas admits that she has said a lot of things that hurt a lot of people outside the house; however, he maintains that she did not do it to be mean to anyone. "The interesting bit about this show is that whatever you really feel eventually starts coming out. But the thing with Hina is that she doesn't intent to hurt people; rather, she is highly opinionated about things and that sometimes comes out in a wrong way. I really don't think Hina is a negative person; it's just that sometimes you forget that talking about things inside the house and giving your opinions about everything on national TV might backfire. She definitely should not have said those things, but I genuinely don't think she meant to hurt people. Some of it was funny but it came out in a wrong manner."
We ask him about his journey with Akash Dadlani, one contestant who managed to get under his skin. "Aaksh was irritating and he often crossed his limits," he says with an eye-roll. "But, in the end, I really felt that he put in his hundred percent to win the game. I couldn't see Puneesh (Sharma) or Luv (Tyagi) winning over Akash. He has really worked hard to stay in the game and he survived despite not having any loyal friend inside the house. Others needed support inside the house but Akash stood all alone, and on top of that he was also very loyal. Puneesh might not have been loyal to me as a friend, or Luv wasn't loyal to Hina but Akash was loyal to Puneesh till the very end."
We end the conversation asking him about his plans post the show. Will we see more of him, Hiten Tejwani and Arshi Khan again? "I will request Hiten to work with me on something great. Arshi, on the other hand, is my great friend, but can you image us working together. Begum saahiba will come on my sets and say Vikas, I cannot do this, what will my aawaam say?' Of course, if something exciting comes along I would love to work with her too." We ask him if he will consider acting and he laughs it off saying "People send me short story scripts on Whatsapp saying Sir act kar lo (Sir act in this)'; however, I don't think acting is for me." Well, till we get to see the Mastermind back in action, here's wishing him luck and thanking him for a great performance on India's most controversial reality show, Bigg Boss.
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