Rakshita


Swetha, popularly known as Rakshita, is an Indian politician, former actress, film producer, dubbing artist, television host and judge. She has acted in Kannada, Tamil and Telugu language films. Rakshita made her acting debut in the 2002 Kannada-language film Appu, alongside Puneeth Rajkumar, following which, she acted in many Kannada and Telugu films.
Her political career began in 2012 when she joined the Badavara Shramikara Raitara Congress. After serving as the president of its women's wing, she joined Janata Dal in 2013 before joining the Bharatiya Janata Party in 2014.

Early life

Rakshita was brought up in Bangalore. Her father B. C. Gowrishankar was a popular cinematographer and one of the most handsome men in the Kannada film industry at the time. Her mother Mamatha Rao is an actress who made her debut in Dr. Raj Kumar's Hosa Belaku and acted in a few meaningful movies like Nagabharana's campus caper Praaya Praaya Praaya and Suresh Heblikar's sensitive Antharala.

Career

Actor

Rakshita started her career with the Kannada movie Appu with Puneeth Rajkumar. She also acted in remakes of the same movie in Telugu titled Idiot and in Tamil titled Dum alongside Silambarasan. She became a top Kannada heroine when Kalasipalya became a big hit. Apart from Puneeth Rajkumar, she formed a successful pair with all the top Kannada heroes of the time - Upendra, Sudeep, Darshan and Aditya. She has also acted with big time heroes such as Vishnuvardhan, V. Ravichandran, Chiranjeevi, Nagarjuna Akkineni, Vijay, Mahesh Babu, Jr NTR, Jagapathi Babu, Ravi Teja, Shivarajkumar,and Silambarasan
After her marriage to director Prem, she cut down on her acting assignments and took over film-making. She turned producer for the prestigious Jogayya directed by Prem, starring Shivarajkumar in the lead.

Politics

Rakshita announced that she had joined the Badavara Shramikara Raitara Congress in March 2012, after politician B. Sriramulu announced of founding it, which eventually happened in 2013. She served as the President of the women's wing of the BSR Congress till April 2013, when she quit the party citing differences with the party members over contesting elections from a constituency of her choice at the Karnataka Legislative Assembly election. In the same month, she joined the Janata Dal. She again had differences with the party over its ignoring her plea for a ticket to contest from Mandya at the 2014 general election, and quit in March 2014, joining the Bharatiya Janata Party. Following this, she became subject to media and public ridicule, and was called a "party-hopper", having changed 3 political parties in two years.

Personal life

She likes reading books, listening to music and traveling. Her favourite authors are Agatha Christie and Sidney Sheldon. She is married to Kannada cinema director Prem.

Filmography

As producer

As actress

Television