Shweta Tiwari and Raja Chaudhary

Shweta Tiwari has a problem. She’s almost completed her first Bhojpuri film. But now her costar Ravi Kissen has left to do something else. “He has upped and left to participate in Bigg Boss. And now my film is stuck! Why don’t they just eliminate him so he can come back and complete my film' We still have 20 per cent of the film to complete.”

On a Wednesday night, Shweta Tiwari stunned the nation by announcing on Nach Baliye 2 that her husband had taken ill and that she’d be dancing alone. “I don’t even want to remember the nightmare of the past week. It was a hard decision,” she says after the brave and enforced solo performance. “But I had no choice.”

Reliving the nightmare of suddenly going solo, Shweta says, “When my husband was detected with a liver abscess we were shattered. It started suddenly with a back pain. He couldn’t stand properly. No medication worked. Wednesday was our Nach Baliye 2 shoot. On Monday morning he was in acute pain. That’s when he was diagnosed with a liver abscess. We took him to Lilavati, then Criticare… no room! Had the whole of Mumbai fallen ill all at once' We finally got a room in Arogyanidhi. We kept hoping he’d be okay by Wednesday. But it was impossible….it was very upsetting. Though my choreographer did my husband’s steps we both missed him. My husband urged me to go on with the show and show them the item that we had planned. It was upsetting. But when everyone said I had won the contest by going there and dancing on behalf of both me and my husband, I felt better.”

She recalls the gruelling hours of rehearsal for Nach Baliye 2. “I’d shoot for my serial Kasautii Zindagii Kay from 9 am to 9 pm and from 9 pm to 4 am I’d rehearse for Nach Baliye 2. Though I wasn’t trained I love dancing. Put on music and you can’t stop me from swaying. Until Nach Baliye 2 I never knew my husband liked dancing. Poor guy! He worked so hard to keep up with me. He rehearsed so hard for this week’s episode. And then he couldn’t perform. But never mind!”

Shweta is seen on television exclusively in Kasautii Zindagii Kay. “And that’s the way I like it. No point in doing several serials since all of them are almost the same. But I do a lot of other things…ads, I’m an RJ on FM radio, I’ve the Bhojpuri film Hamar Saiyyan Hindustani which my husband Raja has produced…. My husband is doing two daily soaps. I was doing a serial with Vinod Pande when Raja came to meet him. That’s how we met.”

Shweta had no problem speaking Bhojpuri. “My family is from Allahabad. So I know Bhojpuri. But I’m a Mumbai girl.”

About her mythic animosity with her Kasautii costar Cezanne Khan, Shweta says, “We don’t get along, that’s it. It often happens in work places. As I came to know him there were things about him that irritated me. We’d argue and fight. I thought it better to keep away completely. We don’t talk to each other at all. On camera we’re professional.”

Will Kasautii Zindagii Kay end soon' “The show must go on. It’s still so popular. And frankly I enjoy doing TV. I’m earning well. And everyone is so sweet to me. The spotboy gets biryani and dosa when I want. My family looks after my daughter Palak. I do miss spending time with her. She comes on the sets. Everyone on the sets pampers her silly. And besides, we get five days off every month. One has to make sacrifices to get something in life…. But, yes, it’s the same serial every day. And I do get tired. In five years I’ve made sure to not look repetitive. That challenge has kept me going.”