Meghna Naidu (born 19 September 1980) is an Indian actress who primarily starred in

Hindi Hindi (Devanāgarī: or , ), or more precisely Modern Standard Hindi (Devanagari: ), is an Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in the Hindi Belt region encompassing parts of northern, central, eastern, and western India. Hindi has been de ...

films. She has also appeared in

Telugu Telugu may refer to: * Telugu language, a major Dravidian language of India *Telugu people, an ethno-linguistic group of India * Telugu script, used to write the Telugu language ** Telugu (Unicode block), a block of Telugu characters in Unicode S ...

Tamil Tamil may refer to: * Tamils, an ethnic group native to India and some other parts of Asia **Sri Lankan Tamils, Tamil people native to Sri Lanka also called ilankai tamils **Tamil Malaysians, Tamil people native to Malaysia * Tamil language, nativ ...

, Kannada, Malayalam, Marathi and Bengali films.

Biography

Meghna Naidu is an Indian actress and dancer. Her first major appearance was in the music video for UMI10's "Kaliyon Ka Chaman" (2002), an official remix of

Lata Mangeshkar Lata Mangeshkar () (born as Hema Mangeshkar; 28 September 1929 – 06 February 2022) was an Indian playback singer and occasional music composer. She is widely considered to have been the greatest and most influential singers in India. Her cont ...

's 1981 song " Thoda Resham Lagta Hai" (in turn, the 2002 song "

Addictive Addiction is a neuropsychological disorder characterized by a persistent and intense urge to engage in certain behaviors, one of which is the usage of a drug, despite substantial harm and other negative consequences. Repetitive drug use oft ...

" by Truth Hurts was inspired by the remix). She was also featured in Saru Maini's video "Dil De Diya Tha (Sutta Mix)" before starting to work in

Indian films The Cinema of India consists of motion pictures produced in India, which had a large effect on world cinema since the late 20th century. Major centers of film production across the country include Mumbai, Chennai, Hyderabad, Visakhapatnam, Ko ...

Early life

Naidu was born on 19 September 1980 in

Vijayawada Vijayawada, formerly known as Bezawada, is the second largest city in the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh and is a part of the state's Capital Region. It is the administrative headquarters of the NTR district. Its metropolitan region comprises NT ...

Andhra Pradesh Andhra Pradesh (, abbr. AP) is a state in the south-eastern coastal region of India. It is the seventh-largest state by area covering an area of and tenth-most populous state with 49,386,799 inhabitants. It is bordered by Telangana to the ...

, India. Her father Ethiraj works for

Air India Air India is the flag carrier airline of India, headquartered at New Delhi. It is owned by Talace Private Limited, a Special-Purpose Vehicle (SPV) of Tata Sons, after Air India Limited's former owner, the Government of India, completed the sa ...

and was a

tennis Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent ( singles) or between two teams of two players each ( doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball ...

coach and her mother Purnima, was a school teacher. She has one younger sister, Sona. She told that she requested her mother to quit her job and accompany her to shooting locations, after her sister who used to travel with her got a job abroad. She grew up in

Mumbai Mumbai (, ; also known as Bombay — the official name until 1995) is the capital city of the Indian state of Maharashtra and the ''de facto'' financial centre of India. According to the United Nations, as of 2018, Mumbai is the second- ...

Maharashtra Maharashtra (; , abbr. MH or Maha) is a states and union territories of India, state in the western India, western peninsular region of India occupying a substantial portion of the Deccan Plateau. Maharashtra is the List of states and union te ...

, and considers herself "more of a Mumbaiite". She studied at Bhavan's College, Andheri, Mumbai, and graduated with a

B.Com A Bachelor of Commerce (abbreviated BComm or BCom; also, ''baccalaureates commercii'') is an undergraduate degree in business, usually awarded in Canada, Australia, India, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Ireland, New Zealand, Ghana, South Africa, Myanma ...

degree. She trained in classical

bharatanatyam Bharatanatyam () is a major form of Indian classical dance that originated in Tamil Nadu. It is one of the eight widely recognized Indian classical dance forms, and expresses South Indian religious themes and spiritual ideas, particularly of S ...

for seven years. She stated that she also was coaching tennis in the US for four years.

Career

At the age of 18, she met a model co-ordinator at the wedding of her cousin in

Chennai Chennai (, ), formerly known as Madras ( the official name until 1996), is the capital city of Tamil Nadu, the southernmost Indian state. The largest city of the state in area and population, Chennai is located on the Coromandel Coast of th ...

, who called her for a screen test for a feature film. She secured a role in the Telugu film ''Prema Sakshi'' (1999), following which she appeared in one more Telugu and two Kannada films. She then appeared in UMI10's music video "Kaliyon Ka Chaman", directed by

Radhika Rao Jonnalagadda Radhika Rao (born 27 March 1971) is an Indian film director. She started her career with her feature film directorial debut '' Lucky: No Time for Love'' (2005) with Vinay Sapru. Her next films were ''I Love NY'' (2015) and '' Sanam T ...

and

Vinay Sapru Vinay Sapru is an Indian feature film, ad film and corporate films director. He runs a film production company known as Rao & Sapru, with his business partner Radhika Rao. Sapru directs movies and has a record of delivering different music v ...

, which she says happened by accident. She was accompanying her friend to the audition for the video, when she was approached by the team. She was asked to send in her photographs and within few days, she was selected for the video. "Kaliyon Ka Chaman" became a grand success and gained her recognition. She subsequently went on to do many stage performances in and outside of India. She made her

Bollywood Hindi cinema, popularly known as Bollywood and formerly as Bombay cinema, refers to the film industry based in Mumbai, engaged in production of motion pictures in Hindi language. The popular term Bollywood, is a portmanteau of "Bombay" (fo ...

debut with the B-grade film '' Hawas'' (2004), which dealt with

extramarital affair An affair is a sexual relationship, romantic friendship, or passionate attachment in which at least one of its participants has a formal or informal commitment to a third person who may neither agree to such relationship nor even be aware of i ...

. It was followed by lead roles in '' Classic Dance of Love'' (2005), which featured her as a dancer, and '' Rain: The Terror Within...'' (2005), in which she played a blind author. In ''Mashooka'', she played a character with negative shades. In her latter career, she mostly made special appearances in

item numbers In Indian cinema, an item number or item song is a musical number inserted into a film that may or may not have any relevance to the plot. The term is commonly used within Indian films (Malayalam, Telugu, Tamil, Hindi, Kannada, Punjabi, and Be ...

in South Indian films. She also participated in the television shows ''

Fear Factor - Khatron Ke Khiladi ''Fear Factor: Khatron Ke Khiladi'' (''Fear Factor: Players of Danger'') also known as (Khatron Ke Khiladi) is an Indian Hindi-language stunt based reality television series based on the American series '' Fear Factor''. First launched as ''Fe ...

'' and ''

Dancing Queen "Dancing Queen" is a Europop and disco song by the Swedish group ABBA, released as the lead single from their fourth studio album, ''Arrival'' (1976). It was written by Benny Andersson, Björn Ulvaeus and Stig Anderson. Andersson and Ulvaeus al ...

''. She played the role of Benazir in the TV series, ''

Jodha Akbar ''Jodha Akbar'' is an Indian Historical drama television series that aired from 18 June 2013 to 7 August 2015 on Zee TV and is also digitally available on ZEE5. The show was produced by Ekta Kapoor under Balaji Telefilms. Starring Rajat Tokas a ...

''.

Personal life

Naidu started a relationship with tennis player Luis Miguel Reis in 2011 and married him on 12 December 2016. She resides in Dubai with her husband and travels to India for work.

Filmography

;Television shows * '' Fear Factor: Khatron Ke Khiladi 1'' on

Colors TV Colors TV is an Indian general entertainment broadcast network owned by Viacom18. The network's programming consists of family dramas, comedies, youth-oriented reality shows, shows on crime and television films. History It was launched on 2 ...

* ''

'' on

* ''

'' on

Zee TV Zee TV (stylised as ZEE TV) is a Hindi general entertainment pay television channel in India. It was launched on 2 October 1992, as the first privately owned TV channel in the country. It is owned by Zee Entertainment Enterprises. Zee TV also ...

* '' MTV Fanaah'' on

MTV India MTV India is an Indian pay television channel specialising in music, reality and youth culture programming. It was launched in 1996 as the Indian version of MTV and is owned by Viacom 18, a joint venture operation between MTV International owne ...

* ''

Adaalat ''Adaalat'' () is an Indian television courtroom drama anthology series about a defence attorney, K.D. Pathak, portrayed by Ronit Roy. First season of the show premiered on Sony on 20 November 2010 and ran for five years, ending on 11 July 2015 ...

'' on

Sony Entertainment Television Sony Entertainment Television (SET) is an Indian Hindi-language general entertainment pay television channel, that was launched on 30 September 1995, and is owned by Culver Max Entertainment, a subsidiary of the Japanese Sony. SET India's You ...

* ''

Sasural Simar Ka ''Sasural Simar Ka'' () is an Indian Hindi-language television soap opera produced by Rashmi Sharma Telefilms, that aired from 25 April 2011 to 2 March 2018 on Colors TV. The show starred Dipika Kakar, Keerti Gaekwad Kelkar, Avika Gor, Dheeraj ...

'' on

Colors Color (American English) or colour (British English) is the visual perceptual property deriving from the spectrum of light interacting with the photoreceptor cells of the eyes. Color categories and physical specifications of color are associa ...

* '' Maharakshak Aryan '' on

References

External links

* * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Naidu, Meghna Living people Actresses in Hindi cinema Actresses in Tamil cinema Actresses in Telugu cinema Actresses in Malayalam cinema Actresses in Bengali cinema Actresses in Kannada cinema Actresses in Telugu television Indian television actresses Indian film actresses 21st-century Indian actresses 1982 births Actresses from Vijayawada Musicians from Vijayawada Singers from Andhra Pradesh Fear Factor: Khatron Ke Khiladi participants