Introduction

An accomplished badminton player and graceful fashion model everyone knows the face of attractive rising Bollywood star for being the best-dressed celebrity in India. Trained in the Japanese martial art of jujutsu, she often performs her own stunts.

Early Life

Although born in Copenhagen, Deepika relocated to Bangalore, India with her parents when she was only one year old. In her early years, she studied at Mount Carmel College and enrolled for a Bachelor’s degree in Arts from Indira Gandhi National Open University.

Being the daughter of a former badminton player Prakash Padukone, Deepika too played badminton at the national level championships. She also played baseball in state level tournaments. Her initial years she focused on badminton and sports, which left her no time to make many friends. She also worked as a child artist for several advertisement campaigns.

However, she left her badminton career to become a fashion model, after consulting her father. In 2004, she became a full time model and appeared in newspaper and TV ads for brands like Liril, Limca and Closeup toothpaste. Soon, she became internationally famous when Maybelline made her their new international cover girl face.

At the fifth annual Kingfisher Fashion Awards, for Indian models and designers, she was awarded the title of Model of the Year. Shortly afterwards, she was chosen as one of the models for the Kingfisher Swimsuit Calendar for 2006, thus cementing her reputation as a supermodel. She also bagged two trophies at the Idea Zee F Awards in 2006 - Female Model of the year (Commercial Assignments) and Fresh Face of the year.

Entry into Filmdom

Deepika’s first film was the Kannada Movie Aishwarya in 2006. In 2007, she played a double role in the blockbuster Bollywood film Om Shanti Om and won a Filmfare Award for Best Female Debut. Up next, she earned accolades for playing the lead female role in the 2009 romance film Love Aaj Kal, and the 2010 drama Lafangey Parindey. After a few unsuccessful films, her claim to fame came in the 2012 hit film Cocktail, which won her several nominations and awards. This jump started her career as a leading actress in Bollywood. The following year she played the leading role in highest grossing films like Yeh Jawani hai Deewani and Chennai Express. In 2013, Deepika won the Filmfare Award for Best Actress in the film Goliyon Ki Raasleela Ram-Leela.

In 2014, she completed filming for Finding Fanny, and still shooting for films like Happy New Year, Tamasha, Piku and Bajirao Mastani.

Awards

• Idea Zee F Awards - Female Model of the year (Commercial Assignments) (2006)

• Idea Zee F Awards - Fresh Face of the year(2006)

• Kingfisher Fashion Awards - Model of the Year (2005)

• Filmfare Awards - Best Female Debut - Om Shanti Om (2008)

• Filmfare Awards - Best Actress - Goliyon Ki Raasleela Ram-Leela(2014)