Do we like Deepika Padukone?
Our score: 7 out of 10. Nothing harmful turned up and there are real good deeds, but the searching was thin on some fronts and one big professional row is still contested.
Deepika Padukone is one of Hindi cinema's biggest names. In 2025 she was named one of the 2026 Hollywood Walk of Fame honourees, which the report calls a first for an Indian actor. We couldn't open a full profile of her early years, so this column leans on the recent record rather than the backstory.
The big stoush is her 2025 exit from Spirit. Reports say it came down to her asking for a fixed eight-hour working day, and the makers of the Kalki 2898 AD sequel said they and she “could not reach an agreement”. She answered that many male superstars have long worked eight-hour days without it making headlines, and that if asking comes across as pushy, so be it.
The newest chapter is from August 2026. Producer Pranay Reddy Vanga, brother of Spirit's director, alleged on NTV Telugu that a profit-share demand of around 10 percent was part of the split, and said remuneration and timing were the central issues. The Gulf News report doesn't carry a response from her, so treat that one as unresolved allegation, not fact.
On the harm check, nothing nasty turned up: no slide into conspiracy theories, no campaigning against any group, and no obviously dodgy company in the projects we found. She called out Mumbai's air quality in March 2026, tagging the city's civic body with “How is this okay!?”, and in 2025 she called an L&T chairman's Sunday-work remark “shocking”. Entertainment outlets also report her backing LGBTQ+ causes, but we couldn't open those pages, so we're not leaning on that.
Her latest social-media spat is a minor one. In April 2026 trolls questioned why she hadn't posted about her husband Ranveer Singh's film Dhurandhar 2, and she hit back online. It's a bit of internet noise rather than a scandal, and it says more about the trolls than about her.
The real stuff: in 2021 she gave Rs1.5 million towards a kidney transplant for Bala Prajapati, an acid attack survivor who co-starred with her in Chhapaak. The campaign was run by the Chhanv Foundation, and 90 per cent of her gift went through it.