Anushka Sharma, 

Ever since her debut in 2008 (in Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi opposite Shah Rukh Khan), Sharma has carved a place for herself in the extremely competitive entertainment industry. Having featured in several top-grossing films, she is among the highest paid female actors. She has channelled that success into creating her own production house, Clean Slate Filmz. Since the beginning, her production company has pushed the envelope with its genres. Its 2015 film NH10, a dark thriller, garnered critical success though it took time to gather momentum commercially. Sharma’s learning was that the audience for such content—which is not standard Bollywood fare—exists more prominently on OTT platforms. They attract a younger demographic which is more exposed to international and diverse content and hence would be more open to stories that are innovative and cutting-edge. This year, then, Clean Slate Filmz released two productions, web series Paatal Lok for Amazon Prime, and horror film Bulbbul for Netflix, both of which were received very well.