While Vivek Agnihotri’s The Vaccine War deals with how India’s scientists fought all odds to create the country’s first indigenous vaccine against the Covid-19, it also includes a villain – and not just the virys. Raima Sen plays a journalist named Rohini Singh Dhulia in the film, who serves as the film’s primary antagonist. Raima plays a woman who is convinced ‘India can’t do it’ and ICMR does not have the expertise to create a good vaccine. In an exclusive interaction with DNA, the actress spoke about why she took on the role and the hate she received for doing the film.
Raima says she was trolled as soon as director Vivek Agnihotri shared her first look weeks back. “I did get the hate and trolling for this. I knew there would be a lot of that because of how the role is,” she says. The actress says that the trolling was unwarranted though. “The moment he announced, I was trolled. People unfollowed me on social media, some called me things. As an actor, my only response to the audience is that I can choose any role that I want to do if I feel that is challenging for me. I don’t understand why actors have to get trolled for taking up a film like this. This is also our profession. It’s not like I am biased to any party. I just did it as an actor,” she says.
Talking about why she took on the role despite knowing that trolling could come her way for it, Raima explains, “As an actor, I accepted the role because I felt it was challenging. People won’t expect me to play such a character, which is where the challenge comes from. People don’t see me as someone who would do a negative character.”
Having made her film debut as a teenager with Godmother in 1998, Raima has been in the film industry for 25 years. The actress says she counts herself lucky to be getting new roles and challenges even after all this while. “That’s the exciting part, that I got something new, something different. I could have carried on doing my shows. To get something completely different from anything that I have done creates impact for me. My last film in Bollywood a while ago. So, I needed something this impactful to be back,” says Raima.
The Vaccine War stars Nana Patekar, Pallavi Joshi, Sapthami Gowda, Girija Oak, Nivedita Bhattacharya, and Anupam Kher. The film released on September 28 to largely positive reviews but had a low opening at the box office.
