Sushant Singh Rajput’s mother isn’t around to bask in the success of her son, post-Dhoni. We asked him about his late mother, who he is otherwise quite reticent about. An emotional Sushant then shared the untold story of how her untimely death has affected him and the way he is these days....
Does it hurt you that your mother isn’t around to see your success?
It’s not that I miss her only when something good or bad happens to me. I wouldn’t lie but I am not incessantly thinking of her. I wish she was alive to see me succeed in life. I am sure she would have been really happy and proud of me. And maybe I would have been a different person than what I am now. The way I looked at things then and now, they are very different and I cannot go back to doing that. It’s unfortunate. But everything that used to excite me, doesn’t excite me that much now. I don’t know why. No relationship, no success, absolutely nothing... If she was alive, probably it wouldn’t concern her, but just because something has changed inside me, everything has become so insipid. It takes a lot out of me to force myself to get overly excited about things and probably this is the reason why I like acting so much. Because it helps me get away from myself.
Are you saying things would have been different were she alive?
(Cuts in) Would you believe if I said I didn’t cry when she died? I actually didn’t. At that point of time, I was thinking why I was not crying (gets emotional). Probably now when I look at it, we cry because there’s a strong sense of loss. And hence we cry at the thought of losing someone we love. I changed on realising that she was dead and no matter what I did, I wouldn’t have her back. It immediately changed so much inside me that I didn’t cry. I was a different person from that point onwards. And it will always stay with me. There’s something I will always regret.
Go on...
So, she would call me every day at around 7-7.30 pm. I was so pampered and I know that every mother pampers their kids, but this was so unconditional, that I cannot explain it. And it took a big, big piece of her when she allowed me to go away and study. She would be, ‘Don’t do anything but stay with me’. And she still allowed me to go. She would call me everyday and would try to pretend to be happy. I could sense all of it. On December 11, I got a call at 11.30 pm. I picked up and she was crying. I was like, ‘What is wrong, What happened?’ She said, ‘Nothing. Can you take out some time and come back?’ I told her, ‘No, abhi kaise hoga? I will come during Holi. Why do you want me to come now? I am okay’, etc. I asked her to stop crying. I was trying to be mature, but I could sense that I didn’t want to go back at that point of time. I knew she was missing me and wanted me around all the time, but I thought this was the right thing to do — to go home later. She just asked me to take care of myself. It felt odd. That was the last line my mom told me. Next day, she had a brain haemorrhage and she passed away. She was 40-something, fine before this suddenly happened.
Do you regret not going back?
I know that I could not have gone the next morning. But this thought of not going for so long when she wanted me to, has stayed with me. Now, there are times when people and sometimes you tell yourself that you should be happy because of these things but you are not happy. It’s like chasing a mirage. There’s a story I read of this guy who’s dying of thirst in a desert. He sees a mirage and runs towards it, only to find nothing. He sees another mirage a while later. He’s aware of his situation now, but he runs anyway because he’s dying. This is what we all are doing. We know that nothing can give one that sense of permanence and psychological security that one is craving for.
