I am a performer, not heroine: Chitrashi Rawat

New Delhi: Eight years after her promising debut as Komal Chautala in "Chak De! India", Chitrashi Rawat has finally bagged a lead role in "Black Home".

Chitrashi said she did not mind the long gap as the actress was looking for "character-driven" roles.

"I have my limitations as a typical glamorous Bollywood actress and I am very honest about that. I want to play character-driven roles. That's why I was not much seen in the last few years.

Now is a good time for different kind of content so I am happy," she told PTI.

"Black Home", which hit theatres last Friday, saw Chitrashi playing a juvenile offender. The film revolved around the harsh realities of remand homes in India.

Chitrashi, seen in cameos in films like "Fashion" and "Tere Naal Love Ho Gaya", said she was unsure of doing "Black Home" because of its hard-hitting story.

"I was numb after hearing script of 'Black Home'. I did not think I could do it. It was a very difficult character and film. The dialogues in the movie are so hard-hitting that it can unnerve anyone.

"It was a cultural shock for me because the part of the society we live in is secure that we don't know the harsh realities. These homes not only have offenders but also orphans or whose parents have disowned them. It is unimaginable that children with no fault of their have to live with convicts," she said.

The actress recalled that there were times when she requested the film's director to tone down her dialogues because they were too hard for her.

"The kind of language my character, Mirchi, speaks is very difficult for me to imagine. I don't think any actor has ever done that but I told my director so many times to cut some dialogues or let me skip them because I felt I could not say such words," she said.

Chitrashi said she was emotionally effected after portraying Mirchi.

"She is this girl, who has murdered her own brother because she was trying to rape her cousin sister. Mirchi is a remand home girl who fights for the weak girls in this unfortunate detention centre. She hates the government, society basically everyone but she love these remand home girls. There's so much bitterness in her. It left me numb," the actress said.

For her role in the film based on true incidents, Chitrashi watched videos of remand homes to get an insight of the life led by convicts there.

"My director did a lot of research so I went through all those videos of pictures of how things work in remand homes. The film is inspired from true incidents so it had to be thoroughly researched," the actress said.

"Black Home" also starred Ashutosh Rana, Mohan Joshi, Murli Sharma and Achint Kaur in pivotal roles.