“I was hesitant to join an already running show.” – Sehban Azim, on being part of ‘Udaan’

Actor Sehban Azim, who joined the cast of Udaan (Colors) a few months back, says that he has been getting an amazing feedback on playing Ajay Khurana and is thrilled to be part of the show.

However, the actor adds that he was hesitant to join the cast initially.

“I was hesitant to join a show which was already on-air for quite sometime. However, my doubts regarding joining an already running show were shunned by the creative head, Tanu Tewari, who convinced me to play the role of a daring and righteous cop, Ajay Khurana. Ajay makes an entry as a beacon of hope in the fictional village, Azadgunj. He is an uncorrupt cop who is very stylish and has a poker faced sense of humour. Ajay has no weaknesses, no family, lives out of a duffel bag as he has been transferred innumerable times in the last two years because of his strict demeanour and flaunts a no-nonsense attitude,” Sehban avers.

“I have received a fabulous feedback from the makers and the viewers as well. The character is nicely sketched and is easy to play,” says Ajay, who has been seen in shows such as Dill Mill Gayye, Dil Dosti Dance and Humsafars previously.

Sehban has been part of the industry for a while now and he feels that TV has not progressed alot over the years. “I think it has been the same from the last eight years. The production has issues with budgets so the quality suffers, creativity suffers and actors get less money. Producers are gradually shifting shoot locations outside Mumbai to balance out the cost of production. There are no bound scripts today because we have a TRP based system and the sponsors keep fluctuating which results in slashing down budgets. But ofcourse, some production houses still manage to provide good content and deliver TRPs,” he expresses.

However, the industry has given him some memorable friendships which he will cherish forever. “I consider myself lucky to have some really good friends and I am still in touch with most of them. I usually say this when I’m asked about having so many friends – Zindagi mein aur kuch kamaya ho ya na kamaya ho, lekin dosti kamayi hai.

Well, from the industry, I am close to Manish Paul, Rohit Nag, Aishwarya Sakhuja, Pooja Sharma, Jennifer Winget, Karan Wahi, Faisal Malik, Aniruddha Rajderkar, Pratik Chavan and Ovais Khan. They have always supported me. Karan and I share a long journey together, ever since we met on the sets of Dill Mill Gayye. We have been friends to an extent that we sometimes end up behaving like the father, mother or a girlfriend to each other. We have grown up together from the past eight years,” he quips.

Talking about friends, his closeness to Jennifer has often sparked off relationship rumours and the two have denied being more than friends.

“These rumours keep coming back. Infact, we had posted a video on our Instagram accounts to clear the air once and for all,” he says.

Kudos Sehban!