When National Award winning heroine Prerana alias 'Rinku M. Rajguru stepped out to write her first HSC exam paper, virtually the whole state wished her 'all the best" here on Thursday.
When she arrived with her parents in a car at the Tuljabhavani College of Arts and Commerce in her home village, Tembhurni, shortly before noon, a huge number of fans thronged the area to catch a glimpse of their favourite "Sairat" girl.
Many youngsters and elders alike were seen shouting "All the best, Rinku", "Do well", "We pray for you" and more as she stepped out of the vehicle and walked quickly to the college gates, armed with her writing pad and pen set.
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A huge police posse requested by the college authorities ensured her uneventful entry into the campus, which will be her exam centre for the next fortnight or so.
Appearing a bit bewildered, a tad nervous about the challenge of the English language paper, the 17-year-old Rinku managed to smile at her fans before being confronted by the 'paparazzi' waiting for her 'bytes'.
"I thank everybody here for your wishes... I wish all the HSC students in the state 'all the best' in their exams," she said with a shy smile and turned quickly to enter the venue.
An external Arts faculty student, over the next few days Rinku will write her Class XII papers in English, Marathi, Political Science, Economics, History and Geography at the same centre.
Along with Rinku, almost 1.50 million students are appearing for the HSC 2019 exams across the state at 2,757 centres.
In 2017, Rinku had cleared her Class X (SSC) exams with 66.40 percent marks, two years after she became famous for her role in the romantic tragedy, "Sairat".
Interestingly, she had harboured dreams of becoming a doctor someday but ended up being perhaps the youngest superstar at the age of 14.
Thanks to her early stardom, she was forced to quit school and appear for both her SSC and HSC exams as an external student, and plans to complete her graduation and post-graduation.
It was at a chance meeting with Mumbai-based two-time National Award winning director Nagraj Manjule, 42, that the then 13-year old Prerana was selected for the role of 'Aarchi' in the blockbuster "Sairat" (2016).
The film in which a wealthy Rinku was seen driving a tractor, zooming on a motorcycle with her pauper boyfriend Akash Thosar, 24, was about how they elope but get caught, survive various tragedies in their love life, later get married and have children, but it ends in a tragedy as both are hacked to death.
The Marathi film collected a large number of awards and honours, and became a rare local (Marathi) film to cross the Rs 5 crore mark, then broke the Rs 10 crore mark and has now set a new benchmark for regional films, breaching the Rs 110 crore club.
The film has already been made in other Indian languages like Hindi, Bengali, Odiya, Kannada and Punjabi besides being dubbed in several languages.
Rinku will appear in a starkly different role in her next Marathi film "Kagar" due to hit the silver screens shortly.
--IANS
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