Deepika Padukone - Bollywood Rising Star

Daughter of the famous badminton player, Prakash Padukone, Deepika Padukone was born on January 5, 1986. She took to modelling at an early age, while still in college and was a supermodel before she turned to acting. Her height, slenderness and fresh looking face have gone a long way in making her a supermodel.

During her modelling years, Deepika has been the face of almost all the famous Indian brands such as Liril, Dabur Lal powder, Close Up and Limca. She has received many prestigious modelling offers, which included becoming the brand ambassadorship of the Jewels of India

Deepika Padukone hit the international scene when cosmetic giants Maybelline made her their international spokesperson. At the 5th annual Kingfisher Fashion Awards she was awarded the title 'Model of the Year'. Shortly afterwards, she was chosen as one of the models for the Kingfisher Swimsuit Calendar for 2006 and won two trophies at the Idea Zee Fashion Awards: 'Female Model of the Year' (Commercial Assignments) and ''Fresh Face of the Year' later that year. Deepika was also chosen as the brand ambassador of Kingfisher Airlines and most recently Levi Strauss and Tissot SA.

After pursuing a successful career in modelling, Padukone decided to give acting a chance as well. She started by starring in the music video for the song 'naam hai tera' from the independent pop album 'Aap Kaa Surroor' by Himesh Reshammiya. In 2006, she made her cinematic debut in the Kannada film, 'Aishwarya', opposite actor Upendra. But it was her Hindi film debut in Farah Khan's 'Om Shanti Om' in 2007, opposite Shah Rukh Khan, which really saw her arrive in films. 'Om Shanti Om' went on to become the biggest hit of the year, both in India and abroad.

Deepika Padukone won the Filmfare 'Best Female Debut' Award and was also nominated in the 'Best Actress' category. Her second film, Yash Raj banner's ''Bachna Ae Haseeno, directed by Siddharth Anand and starring Bipasha Basu, Ranbir Kapoor and Minissha Lamba did see her cast in a big role but she was appreciated for her performance in the movie.

Her next lot of movies like Nikhil Advani's 'Chandni Chowk To China' and Imtiaz Ali's 'Love Aaj Kal', saw her cast opposite heroes like Akshay Kumar and Saif Ali Khan. While Advani's film flopped at the box office, 'Love Aaj Kal', which was Saif's maiden home production, did extremely well and the Saif Deepika pair came in for a lot of praise. Incidentally, the film itself was one of big hits of 2009. The actress was next seen in 'Karthik Calling Karthik' opposite Farhan Akhtar, Sajid Khan's 'Housefull' opposite Akshay and the just released 'Lafangey Parindey' opposite Neil Nitin Mukesh.

Deepika padukone has some other interesting films on hand like Ashutosh Gowariker's 'Khelien Hum Jee Jaan Sey' and Kunal Kohli's ''Break ke Baad, co starring Imran Khan which are scheduled to release. The actress, who was previously seeing Ranbir Kapoor, is now believed to be dating Siddhartha, Vijay Mallya's son. Currently, the actress seems to be on a roll as both her professional and personal life are rocking.