Taarak Mehta Ka Ooltah Chashmah's Sonalika Joshi recalls how her father left lavish life to shift to Mumbai for theirdreams; says 'We left our bungalow and ambassador to live in 1RK'

Sonalika Joshi has been entertaining her fans as Madhavi Bhide in Taarak Mehta Ka Ooltah Chashmah for around 17 years. The actress recently had a podcast with Rajshri Marathi where she got candid about her childhood, her father's sacrifices for her acting career and more.

I was very calm and had a poised behaviour. For me, my motto was not to trouble anyone and nobody should get bothered because of me. So I didn't do all those childhood mastis but I would play with my brother and his friends. So I was quite good at cricket and all. I used to play on the ground with them, I would play Table Tennis and Badminton quite often.

See more: Sonalika Joshi recalls going to audition for Taarak Mehta Ka Ooltah Chashmah on Shailesh Datar's suggestion; says 'I was very sceptical as I had to leave my 4-year-old daughter alone'​

He was never against my inclination towards acting because he loved art. Working in the bank happened because that is what his expertise was in so he continued with it. Since childhood, I had won many awards for acting and all so he knew I had it in me.

We used to live in a bungalow in Jalgaon and had an ambassador car. Leaving all of that, we came to Mumbai and started our lives in 1 room kitchen house. Baba didn't know anything about the city, but for our dreams, he accepted the new city and pushed us to perceive our chance into the field of acting. Read more: Sonalika Joshi recalls going to audition for Taarak Mehta Ka Ooltah Chashmah on Shailesh Datar's suggestion; says 'I was very sceptical as I had to leave my 4-year-old daughter alone'​

Our neighbour was an actor and when he saw me, he asked my mother whether I would act in his play and started getting offers quickly. That was my first play and that too in Hindi, after that I did my first Hindi TV show Udan Chhoo. So I believe, the Hindi Industry was my destiny and years after, I got Taarak Mehta Ka Ooltah Chashmah, the rest has been history.

When I came to Mumbai, the city accepted me quickly because I got busy with work very soon. Today's generation is extremely smart and focused, earlier, I was dedicated to work but I didn't have an aim and all. It is now that I realise that back then Baba had taken such a huge decision of shifting to Mumbai and the sacrifices he made for us.

Shailesh (Datar) is the reason how I got Taarak Mehta Ka Ooltah Chashmah. He had gone to audition for the show but he was already in talks for another show as well and Taarak Mehta's team wasn't allowing an adjustment for him to do two shows so he decided to drop the offer for Bhide's character and chose another show.

Sonalika recalled working in the Marathi Industry with stalwarts and how in her early days she used to do more than 5 shows together where she would have a calendar filled with different shots every hour.