Hiten Tejwani: People didn't like it when I played a baddie

TV actor Hiten Tejwani was recently in Jaipur, where he spoke to us about the time he shot in the city in the sweltering heat and how people didn't like it when he once played a baddie.
Hiten Tejwani knows that this is the best time to visit Jaipur, and that's because he'd spent one month shooting in the city in the sweltering heat of May . “I don't come to Jaipur very often, but I was here for a month at a stretch a couple of years ago when we were shooting for Ratan Ka Rishta.That is when I got to really know Jaipur. The best part was the afternoons, which were surprisingly hot. It was May and we used to shoot outside, and I would just ask the makers, `why are you making me go through this?' All of us used to be dressed up and it was just so hot that I wouldn't be able to open my eyes. And then at about eight or nine, it would be cold, or at least it was cold for Mumbai people.And people here would tell us, `this happens all the time'. But this is a lovely city and the way they do your swagat, they make you feel like a king,“ says the TV actor.
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Hiten, who's currently seen in shows Meri Aashiqui Tum Se Hi and Hamari Sister Didi, will soon be seen in a new show called Gangaa, which is the story of a child widow set in Benaras. He says, “ A lot of social issues have been done on TV , but this one hasn't been shown so far. People probably think that there are no child widows in our country anymore, but that's not true. In this show, we're showing this issue and how one very young girl is affected by it.“ The first few episodes have been shot extensively in Benaras, and Hiten explains, “We have shot a lot in Benaras, but then we shift back to Mumbai. It's not possible to shoot for longer in outdoor locations.“ “Wherever we get permissions it's for a brief period. Whatever time we got, we used it, and now we'll probably go back for some major sequences,“ says the actor.
This is after a substantial period of time that Hiten is playing the lead in a show. Explaining why he was working sparingly , he says, “There were two-three reasons. One, I was getting the same kind of roles.Second, because I initially started doing cameos for friends, there were many offers for cameos. So I told them that if you want me only for a day or two, you'll just be wasting me. So we could probably come up with something better in the future."
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From the time Hiten became a household name on TV till now, how have things changed in the industry? He says, “There are a lot of channels now. Earlier, because there were only two-three channels, people used to watch only those. Now there are far too many choices. The audience has become very broad-minded and they don't want to see the same thing over and over again. Now they want to see real concepts. So that's why the makers make an effort to go and shoot wherever a story is based, so people can connect to it and the characters." He adds, “Things have changed a lot. For me, personally , people's expectations have gone higher. They want to see me in different kind of roles and that is what prompts me to take characters such as the one in Gangaa, something that I haven't done up till now."
But hasn't he mostly played the good guy? “I did a show where I was a baddie, Choti Bahu, but I think people didn't like that. That was a long time ago. But now, thoda sa grey ho toh people also like it because such people exist in the real world. No one's that nice and people are ready to accept real characters," he says.
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