Sweety: I was given a micro-mini skirt and revealing top to wear. I put my foot down.

Priyanka Chopra’s loss is Calcutta model Sweety’s gain in Madhur Bhandarkar’s Fashion. Why? Because she’s the girl who walks away with Arjan Bajwa, Priyanka’s ex-boyfriend in the film, leaving the leading lady in tears!

You just don’t blink and miss Sweety in Fashion, though her screen-time is less than five minutes. The Alipore girl is fetching praises for her eye-catching appearance in a white salwar kameez and charming smile. But that’s a role that Sweety had brushed off at first go.

“I had gone to Goregaon Film City, where Madhur (Bhandarkar) was shooting the climax sequences of Fashion, for a Nescafe ad with some friends. Then all of a sudden, a unit member came to me and offered me the role. I was dumbfounded. I turned it down as I wasn’t too keen on it. Besides, my legs were not shaved! When I said no, he took me to Madhur, who convinced me that it was a ‘small but very significant’ role,” laughs Sweety, now settled in Mumbai.

When she relented, Sweety was put through a make-up test and given the script right away. “I didn’t know I would share screen space with Priyanka Chopra. Madhur explained the scene to me. I got very nervous when he said it was a crucial scene. But then there was another problem. I was given a micro-mini skirt and a revealing top to wear. I put my foot down. Everyone was pissed off with my attitude, but Madhur promptly asked the designers to get me a salwar kameez!” says Sweety, whose first film role was even shorter than Riya (her character in Fashion).

Sweety was seen playing the flute in a pub sequence in Arindam Nandy’s Via Darjeeling. “Actor Arindam Sil (the executive producer of Via Darjeeling) had spotted me at the 2007 Unish Kuri Glam Hunt contest and offered me the role. After that, I played Saheb Chatterjee’s foreigner girlfriend Elizabeth in Subhrajit Mitra’s Mon Amour,” adds Sweety.

But her Mumbai yatra happened for a Balaji Telefilms soap that never took off. “I had shot for the serial but it was scrapped midway. I suffered a lot. For two months I had no work. And then Fashion happened. Now my struggling days are over. People recognise me. And I am getting a few offers too,” she smiles.