Mrunal Thakur on Pooja Meri Jaan, Boundaries and Self-Worth

Mrunal Thakur is done downplaying herself. In a new conversation with Filmfare, the actor reflects on her OTT drama Pooja Meri Jaan and what playing the film’s emotionally layered lead brought up in her own life.

Directed by Navjot Gulati, Pooja Meri Jaan follows a woman whose warmth is read the wrong way. Mrunal says that is exactly why she wanted the part.

A role with real-world resonance

She found the role demanding, mostly because the stakes felt familiar. “There are a lot of Poojas around who are going through this issue,” she said, and her priority was to do justice to their experience.

The film sits inside a larger cultural conversation about consent and obsession. Pooja’s helpful nature is taken as romantic interest, and her personal life becomes public discussion. Mrunal’s takeaway is simple: kindness is not an invitation.

What she learned about herself

While working on the project, she noticed a pattern: she would “go on a guilt trip” and question whether she had done something wrong. She told Filmfare she used to “underestimate myself” and made other people’s emotions more important than her own.

The solution, she says, starts with the people around you. The right friends let you be yourself; they do not pressure you to change. And clear communication matters more than avoiding an awkward moment.

• Kindness is not consent. Being warm or helpful does not signal romantic interest.
• Say no without guilt. A refusal can be respectful if it is conveyed clearly.
• Keep the right circle. People who value you will not ask you to shrink.

Read as a communication framework, her point is practical. A refusal is not a verdict on someone’s character; it is information. If someone takes a decision the wrong way, she says, they may simply be wrong rather than a bad person. That distinction leaves room for more than one point of view.

That framing matters because it separates a boundary from a judgment. The film’s central relationship becomes a case study in what happens when one person’s friendliness is read as availability, and the other person never checks that assumption.

She also widens the lens beyond romance. Asked about one-sided love, she jokes that her one-sided affair is with sleep, but she has watched friends of every gender struggle. Her response: everyone tells her she picks such roles because she is a feminist, and she corrects that she simply believes in equality.

Why this matters for audiences

Mrunal pushes back on the idea that choosing these stories is only about feminism. She says she believes in equality: if something is wrong, it is wrong regardless of gender. Her point is that we often see only one side, when there are several points of view.

For fans, the interview is more than a promotional chat. It is a reminder that the emotional labour women are expected to perform on screen often mirrors what they manage off screen, and that a small shift in how we express refusal can change a relationship.

Source: Filmfare

■

#Bollywood interviews#Boundaries#Mrunal Thakur#Navjot Gulati#OTT#Pooja Meri Jaan#Self-worth