Mumbai, Aug 10 (IANS) As the Shah Rukh Khan-starrer “Chak De! India” clocked 19 years in Hindi cinema since its release on Monday, actress Sagarika Ghatge, who stepped into Bollywood with the sports drama film celebrated the moment.
Sagarika, who rose to fame for playing Preeti Sabharwal in the 2007 film, directed by Shimit Amin, took to Instagram, where she shared a poster of the film featuring the superstar along with the other cast members from the film.
A text overlay read: “Celebrating 19 years of Chak De! India.”
Chak De! India had SRK as Kabir Khan, the former captain of the India men’s national field hockey team. After a disastrous loss to Pakistan, Khan is ostracized from the sport owing to religious prejudice.
7 years later in an attempt to redeem himself, he becomes the coach of the India women’s national field hockey team, with the goal of turning its 16 contentious players into an award-winning team.
Sahni was inspired by the women’s national field hockey team’s win at the 2002 Commonwealth Games to develop Chak De! India’s script after reading about it in a newspaper.
The screenplay was fictional and the characters, while inspired by the real team and coaches, were invented by the director. Kabir Khan’s struggles bore resemblance to those faced by real-life hockey player Mir Ranjan Negi, although Sahni was unaware of Negi’s tribulations while writing the script.
Talking about Sagarika, in 2015, she participated in Fear Factor: Khatron Ke Khiladi 6 and emerged as a finalist. She is a national-level field hockey player.
Other than Chak De! India, the actress has worked in films such as Miley Naa Miley Hum, Rush and Premachi Goshta.
In 2017, the actress announced her engagement to cricketer Zaheer Khan. The two got married in November 2017. The couple welcomed their first child, a boy, in April 2025 and named him Fatehsinh Khan.
