Why We Love Deepika Padukone

It doesn’t really take rocket science to figure out why we love Deepika Padukone.

We figured it out long ago so we put her on the cover (most number of times), crowned her as ‘the most stylish woman in the world’- so much so that now she has no time for interviews.

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But still, like her ex-boyfriends in Bangalore, we wait with undying loyalty, unwilling to say anything remotely nasty. Three years after being put on the map of tinsel town; her life has catapulted her right to the top.

With five releases this year she is, of course, the most liked flavour in Bollywood aka now. As a matter of fact, our dream girl has little to boast about acting-oriented films in her three-year-old career. Don’t mind sweetheart, but we were just scanning your interviews and we saw you playing the same girl in a different production. Saif stole the acclaim in ‘Love Aaj Kal’, while ‘Karthik Calling Karthik’ was a compilation of Farhan Akhtar’s extreme close-ups. She was then seen competing for the “best bikini body” with Lara Dutta (another of our favourite cover girls) in ‘Housefull’. No surprise there as Sajid Khan is always more loyal to the men in his life, we mean, in his film.

‘Lafangey Parindey’ came from a filmmaker who made ‘Laga Chunari Mein Daag’ …do we need to say more? Meant to be forgotten (to be very frank we racked our minds, but couldn’t remember anything worth writing.) What we found was a forced comment about Deepika’s blind act (quite literally) in the film.

Nevertheless there is ‘Break Ke Baad’ (where she looks fabulous) and of course there is Ashutosh Gowariker’s ‘Khelein Hum Jee Jaan se’. The second one got us curious but what we have seen so far is a supermodel playing a freedom fighter.

Too much criticism? Love is not always blind.

Barring this, the 24-year-old enjoys a humongous fan following around the globe. She may have had luck on her side but that doesn’t take away from the hard work she has put in since she was 17. Ask a certain Anushka Sharma, who is still struggling to be recognized even by her family.

Deepika has seen quite a lot especially this year and managed to sail through with élan and poise. Even after a bitter break-up with Ranbir Kapoor (we abhor him because he is such a moron to dump her) Deepika wiped her tears and came back guns blazing. She preferred giving 200 percent to her work commitments. That perfect red carpet appearance in a sari at Cannes (which Aishwarya Rai Bachchan could never get right) is what we are talking about.

But her recent shift to being a feistier, bolder with I-care-a-damn attitude is one to die for. Did you watch her taking potshots at her ex? She actually said on national television that Ranbir is a cheater and that she would like to gift him a pack of condoms. Someone called it “revenge with rubber”. Way to go.

PS- We never mentioned her alleged affair with Siddharth Mallya because we refuse to believe that.

From the December 2010 issue of FHM India.