Bollywood's "brave" actress — where did Nisha Kothari disappear to?
She shared the screen with Amitabh Bachchan and became one of Bollywood's most talked-about faces. Then, almost overnight, she vanished. Here's what happened to Nisha Kothari.
Nisha Kothari — real name Priyanka — was born in Kolkata in the 1980s into a non-Bengali family. Her father ran a chemicals business. After finishing her schooling up to class 10, the family moved to Delhi, where she went on to graduate in chemistry. She also spent six years studying Kathak dance.
After college, Nisha fell into modelling, picking up work with well-known brands and appearing in music videos. She built a solid reputation fairly quickly.
Her film break came in 2003 when R. Madhavan spotted her and offered her an audition for the Tamil film *Joy Joy*. She got the part and made her big-screen debut the same year.
Two years later came the role that put her on the map — a part in Ram Gopal Varma's *Sarkar*, alongside Amitabh Bachchan and Abhishek Bachchan. From that point on, Nisha's career was closely tied to Varma, who either directed or produced most of the films she appeared in. Bollywood began calling her the "brave" actress, a nod to her willingness to take on bold roles.
It wasn't long before rumours of a personal relationship with Varma began circulating. The two were said to have started dating around 2005, keeping things quiet for several years before eventually going their separate ways. When the personal side of things fell apart, so did the professional side. Her last Bollywood appearance was in *Bin Bulaye Barati* in 2011.
Nisha drifted back to South Indian cinema after that, taking on roles in Tamil, Telugu and Kannada films, though none of them made much of an impact. By 2013 she had stepped away from acting altogether, returning briefly in 2016 and then again in 2023 and 2024 — mostly for item numbers.
Her personal life took its own dramatic turn. While away from the screen, she fell for a Delhi businessman named Bhaskar Prakash. Her family strongly disapproved — Bhaskar was from a different caste — and things turned ugly. Her father reportedly threw her out of the Mumbai flat he owned, taking back the keys to the flat and her car.
Nisha married Bhaskar anyway, in April 2016. Her family, it is said, have not been in touch with her since.
These days she lives quietly in Delhi with her husband. Together they run a social welfare organisation focused on supporting underprivileged children. The actress once considered Ram Gopal Varma's brightest discovery has found a very different kind of life — and by all accounts, she seems content with it.
*This article was created by AI and checked by journalists.*