Actor-turned-director Amma Rajasekhar says that late actress Aarthi Agarwal (also spelled Aarti) was desperate to make her comeback in cinema, but she never showed any signs of depression on the sets of "Ranam 2".
Aarthi, who died of heart attack on 5 June, was to make her comeback with "Ranam 2", but she breathed her last on the day of its release. The news about her sudden death came as a rude shock to the members of the film unit.
Rajasekhar started his journey in Tollywood along with Aarthi. He was the choreographer of Nuvvu Naaku Nacchavu, which marked her debut. Having upgraded himself, Rajasekhar became the hero and director of her last film.
Aarthi played the second female lead in "Ranam 2", while "Betting Bangarraju" fame Nidhi appeared as first heroine.
"If she had maintained her body, I would have probably cast her as the main lead. She had put on a lot of weight after her last accident and I guess that bothered her to an extent," Rajasekhar said in an exclusive interview to Deccan Chronicle.
"Because of Aarti, I made several changes to the script — I made her character lengthy and also added an extra song because she requested for it. Though I later decided to remove the song because of the length, we added it back for her fans after the news of her demise," he added.
Having made her acting debut with Hindi film "Paagalpan", Aarthi featured in over 20 films in a span of nine years. She was last seen in the 2009 film, "Posani Gentleman", and later she was struggling to get an offer due to increased weight.
"Aarti never showed any signs of depression while we were shooting for the film over six months back. But she desperately wanted to make a comeback. She once came to me and said 'Rajasekhar, give me one hit movie and I will prove it to them. I want to be the No. 1 actress again," he said.
