Surbhi Jyoti who is a talented theatre artist, debater who has won the national debate thrice and has acted in Punjabi films; now makes her debut in the Hindi GEC space as the female lead Zoya on Qubool Hai on Zee TV. This starlet hails from Jalandhar in Punjab. Regarding her family background she says, "I belong to a Punjabi Brahmin family. My father is into the rubber chemical business and my mom is a homemaker. My younger brother Sooraj Jyoti is pursuing his engineering B.Tech.  My entire family has been very supportive in my acting career and has allowed me to shift here too. They are happy to see the promos. My mom cries a lot on seeing the promos. She after all hadn't imagined that I would leave for Mumbai all by myself so she is missing me a lot."  

Surbhi feels that she is quite like Zoya, the character she plays on Qubool Hai hence she didn't need much preparation to get into the skin of the character. Regarding her on-screen persona Zoya she says, "Zoya is an NRI who is on a vacation in India with her family. She has some goals in life and is determined to achieve them. However she comes across hindrances while realizing her goals. Marriage isn't on her mind and she has many friends just like I do."

Surbhi is happy that she has been cast against two heroes- Karan Singh Grover and Rishabh Sinha who play brothers Asad and Aayan respectively. Both brothers are in love with Zoya. However she thinks that Zoya isn't compatible with either of them. She says in good humour, "Asad isn't a good match for Zoya as they don't have anything in common. He is a cleanliness freak whereas Zoya is a messy person. Asad will say talak thrice when he doesn't like the mess that Zoya has created. Aayan is a flirt- so Zoya will tell him talak thrice too." 

The show will have some sad moments which will require Surbhi to cry. Regarding how she executes those scenes Surbhi says, "I don't use glycerine to cry, I get sentimental during the sad scenes." However don't we have too many tear jerker serials? "Crying is a part of our life. We all cry. We don't cry just on serials," is her reply.  

According to Zoya, her debating and theatre experience has helped her to be a better actor. She explains, "In theatre there are no takes and re-takes. The audience will clap if they like your performance, else throw tomatoes at you. So theatre has helped me to face the camera. Debating has helped me to overcome my inhibitions. After all I had to take the side 'against' in topics like women's empowerment and drug addiction as my teacher thought that I didn't have the tone to talk in the favour of these topics."

Surbhi who is single hopes that eligible bachelors all over India will get to know of her through this show. She laughs, "After people watch my serial I may get marriage proposals. In the process maybe I will become as popular among guys as Karan Singh Grover is among girls." After Surbhi becomes a star maybe we could have Surbhi Ka Swayamvar!

Reporter and Author: Pallavi Bhattacharya