Tripura Student Sayantika Dhar Makes Tollywood Debut

Agartala: Sayantika Dhar, a Class IX student from Udaipur in Tripura, has broken into the Tollywood film scene. She stars in the Bengali feature film Ananda Ashram, which hit theaters on July 31, 2026. The production comes from Maa Durga Production under the direction of Ranjan Dutta. Sayantika is the daughter of the late Tripura Police DSP Surjit Dhar and homemaker Rakhi Singh Dhar. She balances her studies at Udaipur English Medium School with training in classical and Western dance.

Her big break started in April 2025. The family spotted a social media advertisement for the production and reached out. After a video conference and an April 19, 2025, photoshoot in Kolkata, she earned her spot. She then spent three months training at Nandan in Kolkata to prepare for her role. The film, based on a story by Amalesh Chatterjee, follows an orphanage fighting off a corrupt local MLA and his real estate scheme.

The cast includes veterans like Bodhisattwa Majumdar, Kaushik Banerjee, Laboni Sarkar, Shakti Dey, and Soma Chakraborty, alongside fellow young actors Shubhojit Laha and Rittika Mondal. Sumit Acharya composed the music. While the film is finding success, Sayantika feels let down by the local situation. “Being a girl from Udaipur, it is disappointing that the film I acted in is not being screened in my own town because there is no cinema hall here,” she said. She is pushing for a theater to open in her hometown.