Divya Agarwal – a self-made girl is now a youth icon and has made her name with reality TV show Splitsvilla. There's much more to Divya Agarwal than her personal life. From an entrepreneur to an actress, she's an inspiration for today's youngsters.
Here's something you need to know about this bubbly, opinionated and a confident girl who has faced a lot and has always come out as a winner – Divya.
- Divya started off as a dance choreographer. She had her own academy at the age of 17 – almost around 700 students from Navi Mumbai. To brush up her skills, she joined Terence Lewis Academy and later got professional recognition in the field of dance.
- She even had a boutique named 'Zodiac' in Mumbai. She used to stitch clothes and style people but she realised that it wasn't her true calling.
- Social media star Divya's first on-set experience was in 2011 when Karan Johar was shooting for Student of the Year. She was one of the background students amongst thousands of others and was paid Rs 800 a day.
- Divya moved to Dubai when she was 19 to join in as a Business Development Manager alongside studying. After 18 months, due to unfortunate reasons, the company was demolished overnight and got shut. She left everything and came back to India and joined the same college she left in the first place. She went into depression as the students taunted and bullied a lot saying, 'Wapas aagayi ye to'. But the girl never gave up!
- After Dubai, she entered in a city pageant. Then went on to becoming Indian Princess 2016. This pageant took her back to Dubai. She said: "As much as I wanted to run away from that city, I prayed for things to work in my favour and it did. My belief held me strong."
- She started her career in commercial advertisements. Her first ad was not as a model but as a dance choreographer, where she trained Ileana D'Cruz and other models.
- To get familiar with the camera, she joined teleshopping channels like Naaptol and Best Deal TV. She says: "My payments used to be very less back then. It was struggling period for me but the way I groomed myself working for long hours, it was satisfying. At the end, it was my work and I loved it and it eventually became a part of my learning."
- During her struggle period, she got offers like being a body double for Katrina Kaif in a few ads (Yardley and Lux). Recalling her experience, she says: "They used to call me when they had to fix lights or figure out camera angles – a job is a job, it wasn't bad but when your goals are high, you feel sad. And since then I made a promise to myself that if I ever become a star, I will never allow anyone to be my body double."
- Divya has done three Marathi songs which will be out soon. She was also a part of commercial ads for jewellery with Vani Kapoor. She trained Shilpa Shetty for an ad. Divya was also a part of a cereal brand with Deepika Padukone. Divya was also a part of item song with Kunal Roy Kapoor in the film The Final Exit.
- Her first appearance was in the song starring Shilpa Shetty and Neha Kakkar titled as 'Wedding Da Season'
- She later auditioned for Baadshah's Swag song and was selected among 80 girls. Post that she did three songs with SaReGaMa and Zee Music.
- Divya mentions: "The best moment till date was when I represented India in Malaysia as Indian Princess 2016. I was in the top 20. It felt great to be a part of a world pageant. There were 63 countries that participated and I can now say that I have friends all over the country."
- Finally, Splitsvilla happened which got her the most recognition and there are over 40-50 fan groups dedicated to Divya on social media.
