Rashmika Mandanna

Some Lesser Known Facts About Rashmika Mandanna

• Rashmika Mandanna was born in a middle-class family in Virajpet (Virajapete), Kodagu, Karnataka.

  

• She was inclined towards acting from a very young age.

• In 2014, she won the Clean & Clear Fresh Face contest and became the brand ambassador of Clean & Clear.

  

• Subsequently, she started taking up modelling assignments.

• In 2016, Rashmika participated in Lamode Bangalore’s top model hunt where she caught the eyes of the makers of the film “Kirik Party” who offered her a lead role in the film.

• Mandanna met Rakshit Shetty (actor) on the sets of her film “Kirik Party” and fell in love with him. The duo got engaged to each other on 3 July 2017 in a private ceremony in Virajpet.

  

• In September 2018, the couple mutually called off their engagement citing compatibility issues.

• After Kirik Party, Rashmika featured in two highly successful films “Anjani Putra” and “Chamak.”

• She made her Telugu film debut in 2018 with the romantic drama “Chalo.”

• In the same year, Rashmika appeared in the romantic comedy “Geetha Govindam,” which went on to become one of the highest profit earners in the history of the Telugu Cinema.

  

• In 2020, Rashmika bagged her debut Tamil film “Sultan.”

• In 2017, she ranked first on Bangalore Times list of ’30 Most Desirable Women.

  

• Rashmika is one of the very few actresses who has entered Tollywood’s Rs. 100 crore club in a short span.

• She is also one of the highest-paid actresses in the Telugu and Kannada film industries.

• Search engine giant Google recognized her as the “National Crush of India” for the year 2020. ^[4]The Times of India

• On 21 December 2021, amid the rave reviews of her latest release Pushpa The Rise, she took to social media to talk about the dark side of being an actor. On her Instagram stories, she shared the photo of her arm and explained the pain that she had to go through to keep it hairless.

• Rashika was subjected to cybercrime after a fabricated video of her went viral on the internet in November 2023. The video, which featured Rashmika in a black dress while entering an elevator, was originally of another woman, a British-Indian influencer named Zara Patel. As this deepfake AI-generated video of her circulated on the internet, Rashmika expressed her concern through social media following which many personalities including Amitabh Bachchan, Mrunal Thakur, and Rajeev Chandrasekhar, voiced their support for her. ^[5]Mint

  

• In October 2024, she was appointed the National Ambassador for Promoting Cyber Safety by the Ministry of Home Affairs’ Indian Cybercrime Coordination Centre (I4C).

• In September 2025, Rashmika won the Best Actress – Telugu award for the film ‘Pushpa 2: The Rule’ at the 13th South Indian International Movie Awards (SIIMA).