Why Was Priyanka Called ‘Plastic Chopra’? Read In Her Own Words

By OB Bureau On Feb 10, 2021

Priyanka Chopra hurt — Picture courtesy tellusdaily.com

From being called ‘kaali’ (dark) in school, to being body-shamed, being called ‘plastic chopra’ and battling patriarchy, actor Priyanka Chopra has gone through it all in her struggling days. Perhaps the same people are swooning over her now, marvelling at her success!

Bollywood’s dark, well-kept secrets and anecdotes of Priyanka’s ‘I dare you’ attitude are all tumbling out one after another in her just-released memoir ‘Unfinished’.

The actor speaks about her ‘obviously different nose’ that the public noticed in the early 2000s and how she had undergone a botched surgery leaving her ‘horrified’ at what had happened.

The fallout of the surgery was that people started calling her ‘Plastic Chopra’ without bothering to know the real story.

Apparently, she had trouble breathing, and it was discovered that she had a ‘polyp’ in her nasal cavity. Believing it to be a routine procedure, Priyanka decided to have the polyp surgically removed. This was in 2001, the year after she won Miss World, and around when she decided to take a plunge into the film industry, Hindustan Times (HT) reported.

“While shaving off the polyp, the doctor also accidentally shaved the bridge of my nose and the bridge collapsed. When it was time to remove the bandages and the condition of my nose was revealed, Mom and I were horrified. My original nose was gone. My face looked completely different. I wasn’t me anymore.” Priyanka continued, “I felt devastated and hopeless. Every time I looked in the mirror, a stranger looked back at me, and I didn’t think my sense of self or my self-esteem would ever recover from the blow.”

Priyanka wrote that while she was ‘dared’ to give an explanation for her ‘obviously different nose’, she chose to ‘draw a line’ and not speak about it publicly.

“I decided that there was a line I was going to draw in my life. I am an entertainer. That’s what I’ve signed on to do, and that’s what I love doing. I will say my lines, dance my dance, hit my mark. I’ll do my best to make you laugh, and I’ll do my best to make you cry, but just because I’m a public person doesn’t mean everything about my life has to be public knowledge. I get to choose what I share and when I share it.”

Priyanka ended up getting corrective surgeries to fix the damage done. “While it took a few years of seeing a stranger gazing back at me every time I looked in the mirror, I’ve gotten accustomed to this face. Now when I look in the mirror, I am no longer surprised; I’ve made peace with this slightly different me,” she wrote.

In another incident, she recalled how she quit a film because for the filming of a seductive song, the director told her whatever happens, “her panties should show” otherwise why would people come to watch the movie!