Saina Nehwal On Parineeti Chopra Unfollowing Her On Instagram After Biopic: "We Never Became Friends"

Parineeti Chopra played the role of Saina Nehwal in her biopic Saina. Released in 2021, the Amole Gupte directorial traced the badminton star's journey from a young girl in Hyderabad to becoming a world No. 1 shuttler and an Olympic medallist. While the film received mixed reviews overall, Parineeti's performance was largely appreciated.

Years after the film's release, Saina has once again found itself in the spotlight, this time due to social media chatter. Fans recently noticed that Parineeti does not follow Saina Nehwal on Instagram, even though Saina had followed the actor earlier. The observation quickly led to online speculation about a possible fallout between the two.

Saina Nehwal has now addressed the issue and cleared the air. Speaking to Subhojit Ghosh on his YouTube channel, the athlete said she never really noticed the follow-unfollow talk and stressed that there was no personal issue involved. 

“Actually, I did not notice this and na kabhi dhyan gaya hain ispe. Kyuki life has been so busy with my training and tournaments and events ki iss cheez pe dhyan nahi gaya. Jitna bhi baatein hui hain humari, it's not like ki friends ban gaye the kuch… in a few sessions I was also like a professional telling her ki maine life mein kya-kya kiya, maine kuch bola hi nahi ki maine friendship kari thi ya kuch. (Actually, I did not notice this, and it never really caught my attention. Life has been so busy with my training, tournaments and events that I never focused on this. Whatever conversations we had, it is not like we became friends or anything. In a few sessions, I was more like a professional, telling her about what I have done in my life – I never said that we had a friendship or anything like that),” she said.

Saina Nehwal explained that their interaction was limited to work related to the film and nothing more. She added that her tight schedule left little room for socialising outside professional commitments.

Talking further about how their meetings were structured, Saina shared, “It was totally professional work for which she was there, and I knew that. I was busy with my training. I also could not give so much of time. Ki hum dinners ya lunch pe jaaye. Utna kabhi hua nahi. Jitna bhi 1-2 ghante mein, once in 2-3 weeks hum milke, director saab was there. (We never really went out for dinners or lunches. That never happened. Whenever we met for an hour or two, once every two or three weeks, the director was always there.)”

She continued, “And I explained to her about my journey and all that. Aisa kuch bhi nahi tha ki humne bohot time spend kiya taki hum friends ban sake, it was mostly about the work which she was about to do… But humne kuch zyada friendship nahi banayi thi to follow or unfollow. (There was nothing like us spending a lot of time together to become friends. It was mostly about the work she was going to do. We did not really form any close friendship for things like following or unfollowing each other.)"

As of today (January 30), neither Saina Nehwal nor Parineeti Chopra follow each other on Instagram. With her clarification, Saina has made it clear that there was no fallout, only a professional association that ended with the film.