Bengali serial to depict struggle of female athletes

Bengali TV serial “Run Rony Run” will showcase the problems girl athletes face in the male-dominated world of sports.

The first of its kind on Bengali small screen, the show will have shots of real-time training sessions at stadiums under the supervision by national coaches and international sportspersons.

“The role of Rony is played by young actress Sreyoshree Roy. She underwent real time training for two months running regular 200 metres at the Salt Lake Stadium under the supervision of coach Kuntal Roy and his student Sushmita Singha Roy,” Director of the serial Arindam Basu said.

“Kuntal Roy is in our advisory committee while for the training part in athletics we took the inputs from Sushmita, we had also extensively spoken to four-five other sportsmen from different disciplines about how they faced the situation regarding family and society,” he added.

The show, deriving from real life incidents and experiences of sportspersons, also focuses on athletes getting caught in politics.

Sreyoshree, a Class X student, who plays the lead role said Kabaddi is her favourite sport.

“After I signed for this project, I was asked to see the Bengali classic ‘Koni’, recently acclaimed ‘Bhaag Milkha Bhaag’ and ‘MS Dhoni: The Untold Story’ for preparations and I watched all,” she said.

“Also by training sprints for two months and swimming at a pool, I have shed 4-5 kg of weight and acquired the tall, skinny look,” she said.

The TV serial will air from November 2.