Born in Jamshedpur, Jharkhand, Tanushree comes from a conservative Hindu
Bengali family, and had her personality groomed according to strict
social norms, resulting in her being shy and very introverted. Her father Tapan was an employee of the Life Insurance
Corporation of India. Her mother is a housewife.
Tanushree finished junior school in her hometown and completed high school
studies in Pune. She dropped out of college to pursue a career in
modeling which was a long-cherished dream. She first started modeling
for ramp shows, local ad campaigns, print shoots etc., and worked part time
as a sales junior executive at an event management company while she
built her resume and portfolio as an amateur model and actor.
Tanushree took part in several local beauty beauty pageants in Pune in
2003. She also appeared in music videos, stage shows, a Bengali show on
local TV, Bangladeshi ad campaigns and several print and commercial
assignments and finally went on to take part in and win the title at the
Miss India pageant in 2004 which was a turning point in her career. In
June 2004 she represented India amongst 133 countries at the Miss
Universe pageant in Quito, Equador in South America. She placed amongst
the top ten participants at the finals.
During her growing-up years Tanushree was exposed to Indian classical
music and dance and had been trained in painting and fine arts at the
Rabindranath Tagore Society for Arts for a few years. From a very early
age Tanushree had an inclination towards the performing arts. The title
of Miss India opened doors for her and she started
receiving offers from Bollywood as a lead actor. She also bagged several
prestigious modeling assignments thereafter with top Indian designers
and national brands.
Her career as an actress started with the films 'Chocolate' and 'Ashique
Banaya Apne' in 2005. 'Ashique Banaya Apne' went on to become a box
office success and the music of the film broke all existing records in
Indian cinema till date, whereas the film'Chocolate'received a lukewarm response
and failed to create an impact at the box office. Still, the double impact
of these films proved to be a perfect launch pad for Tanushree into
Bollywood. She worked in several other feature films after
that - romance, comedy, horror, thriller and action were the different
genres that she covered in a short career span of five years from
2005-2010.
Tanushree has very often made headlines for her red carpet appearances,
personal life and the controversies very common in Bollywood. Putting up
a brave front and maintaining a dignified silence, she has let her talent and work
talk for her and eventually proven her detractors wrong by
garnering rave reviews for her performances in latter films like
Rokk, Apartment, and Rama the Saviour.
Tanushree culminated her career with the film 'Rama the Saviour' that
released in November 2010 and went on a self-imposed sabbatical for two
and a half years.During this time she traveled extensively and pursued
different and varied personal interests like spirituality, yoga and
eastern mysticism as well as adventure sports. She rediscovered and
reinvented herself through this whole process.She was back in the
limelight in the spring of 2013 with stunning appearances at several
high profile media and red carpet events.