Alia Bhatt on the Cover of Vogue India

😳 She is looking pretty ❤️

Looking nice . Only Bollywood kid I like

Gorgeous ❤️ Skin goals👏

https://www.vogue.in/content/alia-bhatt-it-makes-me-anxious-to-think-whether-i-am-doing-right-by-my-baby-and-work-may-june-2023-cover-story

Alia Bhatt: “It makes me anxious to think whether I am doing right by my baby and work”

It may seem like no time has passed between having her baby and returning to the screen, but Alia Bhatt has quietly been centring herself and building a new life with her five-month-old daughter Raha and husband Ranbir Kapoor in tow

BY SADAF SHAIKH

On the day Alia Bhatt and I speak, she is perfectly exhausted—and understandably so. The actor has just returned from a work-cum-birthday trip to London, where she also shot for Vogue India’s cover, and straightaway proceeded to debut three snatched looks back to back at the launch of the Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Centre (NMACC) in Mumbai alongside shaking a leg to the Oscar-winning number “Naatu Naatu” from her movie RRR (2022). Acting has always come instinctively to Bhatt since she appeared in a minor role in the psychological thriller Sangharsh (1999) when she was just six, but she has lately come into her own as a discerning clotheshorse: a fact that everyone present on the set of the cover shoot can attest to. Kitted out in an array of avant-garde ensembles—including a billowing electric blue dress from Richard Quinn, a frothy tulle skirt from Molly Goddard, and a skirt-jeans-jacket assemblage from Simone Rocha and Karu Research—the 30-year-old seemed as at home posing and primping in Gunnersbury Park in London as a seasoned runway model would. It’s perhaps this new-found penchant for fashion that put her on the radar of the MET Gala, which she will attend for the first time next month.

Today, at home in Mumbai, she’s taking it easy and allowing herself to kick back. She’s also giddy with happiness despite being enervated because her five-month-old daughter has “touched my face and squeezed my cheek for the first time”, a milestone moment that the newly minted mother wants to hit replay on over and over again.

It doesn’t take special powers to deduce that Bhatt has had the busiest two years of her life. In 2022, she starred in four films (one of which she also co-produced), began work on her debut Hollywood project, tied the knot and announced her pregnancy. This year, she’s looking forward to the release of Rocky Aur Rani Ki Prem Kahani opposite Ranveer Singh and Heart of Stone starring Gal Gadot and Jamie Dornan, as well as Jee Le Zaraa with Priyanka Chopra Jonas and Katrina Kaif going on floors. If anything, she’s the one with special powers.

Bhatt chuckles when I breathlessly list out all of the above and practically scream at her in my bewilderment to figure out just how she manages to do it all on top of being such a ‘present’ mother. “I’m just taking each day as it comes,” she intones simply but sagely. “I’m not putting too much pressure on either Raha or myself to be together as a family unit with Ranbir all the time. She’s just five months old and I’m so impressed with how well-behaved and peaceful she is. And on days when she isn’t, that’s fine too, because she’s a baby and has the right to have good and bad days. Similarly, I, as a mum, have the right to have great and terrible days too—even though it’s very difficult for me to not have it together at all times because I’m such a control freak. I always want to ace things and usually have everything under check. I guess what grounds me is how passionate I am about my work.

I nod in vigorous agreement at that last line. After all, Bhatt has held her head high and soldiered on despite having fielded unrelenting criticism since making her debut in Karan Johar’s Student of the Year 11 years ago—most notably for her sparse intellect and being a product of privilege. But neither naysayers nor trolls can deny the kind of authenticity she brings to the screen and the characters she plays, a quality that has earned her some of the most demanding and coveted roles in Bollywood. After critics argued that Johar had tailor-made the part of rich-kid Shanaya Singhania for her in her debut film, Bhatt sent forth a volley of compelling performances through Highway (2014), 2 States (2014), Dear Zindagi (2016) and Raazi (2018), and, just for good measure, drove her point home with a continued slew of impassioned roles in Gully Boy (2019), Gangubai Kathiawadi (2022) and Darlings (2022). You would think that ought to have dulcified wagging tongues, but read the comments on even a single one of her Instagram posts and you’ll notice the very targeted slander Bhatt has to deal with daily—from constantly being pitted against Deepika Padukone to being blamed for Ranbir Kapoor’s unconfirmed and unfounded melancholy. It’s a good thing, then, that her ears are finely attuned to the thunderous applause her work rightfully receives and the sweet euphony of her daughter’s cooing.

“Raha is such a happy baby,” she beams. “You just need to give her a little smile and she will return it tenfold. She’s just starting to find her voice, so Ranbir and I call her ‘cheetah’ because of all these tiny sounds she makes while trying to communicate. Looking at her face makes everything worth it, even on the toughest days. Just holding her close feels so important right now since I know she’s going to grow up too soon and not want to sit in my lap or hang out with me anymore.”

That’s not to say that juggling work and motherhood is easy just because Bhatt makes it look so blissful. Although her position and privilege allow her access to the best childcare money can buy—for which she is immensely grateful—the actor hopes to be as involved in her child’s upbringing as any regular mother would. But consider the fact that she is at perhaps the most pivotal juncture of her career, coupled with the less-than-encouraging history of the Indian film industry phasing out actors who become mothers or age in the limelight, and it’s clear to see that Bhatt is bound to feel like she’s being pulled in all directions. It also doesn’t help that the internet’s self-appointed custodians of perfect parenting keep chiding her to stay home and take care of Raha instead of returning to work. Bhatt reminds me that she studiously tunes out the noise, “but there is still a healthy amount of mom guilt,” she concedes. “It does make me anxious to think whether I am doing right by my baby and work. There’s so much pressure on women to ace both...almost like this old-school dogma that once you have a baby, you have to martyr your career or you’re not a model mum. It’s very important for new mothers to get that time off work to gather their bearings, and it’s equally crucial for corporations and industries to grant them that time instead of writing them off.” Is it less challenging for her because of her star status? I ask. “It definitely is, but I’m always wondering what people are thinking. Do they actually think I’m managing well or are they only saying it to placate me? Even if there isn’t judgement, you feel very critical of yourself. But I work hard at my mental health—I go to therapy every week where I voice these fears. And it helps me understand that this is not something that I will be able to figure out on day one or five or even ten; it’s an ever-evolving, ever-growing process. You have to be able to pick up the pieces of yourself and build anew every day. There’s nothing like, ‘Oh I’ve got it together... I’m coping excellently... I have all the answers.’ No one has all the answers.”

When it comes to the Indian family unit, mothers have traditionally been looked upon as caregivers while fathers are reflexively assigned the role of breadwinners—a depiction further perpetuated by Bollywood films in the ’90s and early aughts. It’s only in recent times, where a working mother has become the norm rather than an anomaly, that the function of fatherhood has been allotted equal heft. Bhatt’s eyes glimmer with the trademark twinkle that appears whenever she talks about her husband. “The Ranbir I know has always been very sensitive, loyal and supportive. But he has become even more sensitive since Raha was born. He absolutely dotes on her,” she effuses.“It’s adorable to watch the two of them together because he’s had to bulk up quite a bit for his character in Animal, so when he carries her, it’s like this giant picking up a little puppy. Ranbir is such a hands-on father at home that it sometimes gets difficult for me to even hold her for a second. And he’s got very unique ways of hanging out with Raha—he likes to sit with her in front of the window where the breeze comes in and make sure she spends a good amount of time looking at the big green plant there. He thinks of her as this earthly sprite. He’s travelling at the moment, so I try to recreate that same routine with Raha because Ranbir’s constantly nervous that she’ll forget him.”

One hour into our chat, I’m still full of questions—as is expected when one is speaking to an actor of Bhatt’s calibre—and each of her perspicacious responses spawns another query in return. But a delicate babble from Raha instantly seizes her attention and I know that our time together is up. My parting question to her, then, is about a different kind of offspring. “Ah, that baby,” she shakes her head knowingly at the ‘nepo baby’ tag that has remained glued to her despite her sincere efforts to shake it off. “The only thing I can do is build a body of work which hopefully proves I belong in this industry,” she says. “I always make it a point to acknowledge the easy start I got at the beginning of my career. And sure, it will get you in the room, but then it’s up to you to work that room. The audience is actually the best judge of talent. You could come from a background that props you up but the audience will ultimately decide whether or not you belong there.” And Bhatt’s meteoric ascent to superstardom is proof enough that she not only belongs in Bollywood but is well on her way to becoming one of its most enduring icons.

Photographed by: Vivek Vadoliya

Styled by: Megha Kapoor

Hair: Neil Moodie

Makeup: Lauren Reynolds

Manicurist: Edyta Betka

Production: Art Production

Set designer: Amy Friend

Photographer’s assistants: Ryan Rivers, Aurelie Lagoutte

Assistant stylists: Rupangi Grover, Jack O’Neill

Assistant hairstylist: Daniel Moura

Assistant makeup artist: Hanna Friedrich

Assistant set designer: Alice Medlock

Digi tech: Lisa Bennett

Processing: Rapid Eye

Printing: Sarah England

Retouch: Studio RM

Bookings editor: Savio Gerhart

People should learn from her how to steal the credit of something that’s not hers. She has been shamelessly milking the ‘Naatu Naatu’. She performed for that silly Kesariya also, but no mention of it anywhere.😅At least not in the first 4 lines that I brought y self to read.

She looks bad here.