‘Struggled to get work when I got married’: Soni Razdan on changing times

Sometimes, it all comes down to instinct. That’s what happened with actor Soni Razdan when director Danish Renzu mentioned that he was planning a biopic on the Kashmiri music icon Raj Begum and wanted her to play the protagonist. Instinctively, she said yes. “I didn’t even read the script. I said yes, there and then,” smiles Razdan, recalling how Songs of Paradise had her heart from the moment she heard of it.

Luckily, the film found legs. Producer Shafat Qazi and Amazon Prime Video backed Renzu’s vision, while Excel Entertainment came on board as the presenters. Led by Saba Azad and Razdan, Songs of Paradise — also starring Taaruk Raina, Zain Khan Durrani, Sheeba Chadha, and Shishir Sharma — tells the largely unheard story of Begum, who began her career singing at weddings and emerged as the first female voice for Radio Kashmir in 1954. Known as the Melody Queen of Kashmir, the Padma Shri awardee broke several social and cultural barriers.

Raj Begum

A part of Begum’s journey also had her resisting marriage. It’s depicted in the movie, with the character declaring that a woman is not born only to be married. Razdan, who forayed into cinema in the 1980s, says it’s heartening to see how things have changed, from Begum’s times to hers to now when marriage no longer means the end of an actor’s career. “You no longer have to feel that it is the end of the road. There are many more new roles [written for today’s married actors]. Earlier, if you were married, you were out. I struggled to get work when I got married. Luckily, TV happened around that time and people gave me work. But I had to push very hard,” she reflects.

The senior actor believes the importance laid on marriage for women has reduced, thanks to their financial independence. “Economic independence is definitely one of the reasons,” says Razdan, while also noting that things haven’t necessarily changed for women across different strata. “Unfortunately, there are so many people who are shackled, even in the cities. They can’t do what they want to do. They marry into big families, or their family is controlling them. It still isn’t easy for women.”