Mumbai, March 7 (IANS): Actress Sonakshi Sinha has heaped praise on filmmaker Sanjay Leela Bhansali and said that the way he portrays women on screen, nobody else is able to do that.

Sonakshi will be featuring in Bhansali’s upcoming series “Heeramandi: The Diamond Bazaar”, which also stars Manisha Koirala, Aditi Rao Hydari, Sharmin Segal, Richa Chadha, and Sanjeeda Sheikh.

The actress was joined by Tanya Bami, series head, Netflix India, on a panel about championing women’s stories in the age of streaming organised by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI), reports variety.com.

Bami called the series as “India’s gift to the world.”

To which, Sonakshi added: “Sanjay sir and I have been trying to collaborate for many years now and I’m so glad it happened on ‘Heeramandi,’ the way he portrays women on screen, nobody else is able to do that.”

“Heeramandi” tells the stories of six women, Sonakshi said about the series, which is set in the midst of multiple power struggles in Heeramandi, Lahore and more generally in undivided, pre-independence India, where anti-colonial freedom movements were emerging.

To be a part of something like this, it’s been tremendous, to say the least,” said the actress, adding that the majority of the team were women.

She added: “Girls were running that world.”

The actress made her Bollywood debut in 2010 with the Salman Khan-starrer “Dabangg”. SHe made her series debut with “Dahaad” in 2023.

“It’s the best time to be a female actor in the (Indian) industry, there’s so many more openings. Now, with the advent of OTT (streaming) doing the kind of work that they’ve been doing, putting out content where even more roles are being written for strong female characters- I’m so happy to be a part of that,” she said.