The recently released web series Operation Safed Sagar showed the bravery of the Indian Air Force in the 1999 Kargil War. The series stayed away from the jingoistic and aggressive form of patriotism usually shown on screen, and actor Dia Mirza Rekhi , who plays an Army wife in the show, feels it’s this refreshing portrayal that has also helped the audience connect with it.
Check out the entire chat with the Operation Safed Sagar cast here:
Having played an Army wife in the show, Dia Mirza Rekhi reflects on the life that they lead and how it is different from the normal world. You marry into the community. You marry into an entirely different way of life. You are isolated, you live in a complex where you’re unto yourself. Of course, you have a school and all kinds of other amenities which are beautifully created for you. But you’re not really interacting and engaging with everyday normal life. The actor adds that the uncertainty of their lives is something no one else can understand. We didn’t have to kind of put ourselves out there physically as much as the men in the story did. We all felt like such a small part of something much larger than all of us,” she ends.
And they were really out there physically from 50° temperatures to -20,which was the lowest temperature they shot in. Because you don’t marry just the person you’re marrying, “It’s time that we spend understanding what it may be like to be married into the Air Force,. Because our work environment was simpler, dia also lauds the efforts of her male co-stars in the show — Jimmy Shergill, Siddharth, Abhay Verma , Taaruk Raina, Mihir Ahuja and Arnav Bhasin. ”I think the women had it a lot easier on set. Because the heroism, the masculinity of the story is in the quiet acceptance of uncertainty and the spirit of truth that resonates beyond it, the crew, the cast, the boys, I’ve not heard them talk about it once. Because these guys are so much more and beyond that, so, it’s like why will I be complaining about the heat and why would I be complaining about the cold.
It’s a very different world,” she says. It was a very humbling experience,” she says. “To live with that constant reminder that today may be the last time you see your spouse, every single day of your life, I can’t even imagine how hard that must be.
