When Neena Gupta told Masaba how Viv Richards wasn’t ‘family man’: ‘She’d feel bad that he was not in touch’

Neena Gupta once opened up about how her daughter Masaba Gupta would feel bad when her father, West Indies cricketer Vivian Richards, did not stay in touch. The actor, who was a single mother to Masaba, had helped her daughter understand Vivian.

Neena Gupta and Vivian Richards had Masaba Gupta out of wedlock. The fashion designer had shared a picture earlier this year in which Neena, Vivian and a little Masaba were seen together with their family. However, during an interview in 2015, Neena revealed to a leading daily that Vivian was briefly not in touch with Masaba when she was growing up.

“I told her how her father is not a family man and how he was like this and this. In the beginning, she would feel bad that Vivian was not in touch with her till the age of about 20, but then he got in touch. His problem also is that he is not net savvy and so, it is very difficult to get in touch with him,” she explained.

“Sometimes, he would call her on her birthday and sometimes, he would not call for even three years. Sometimes, he would come here and meet and sometimes not. By then, I knew him and how he was. If I told him I needed something, he would go mad finding it to bring it for me, but on his own, he would not bring anything. He is a person who cannot express his emotions,” she added.

Neena also shared, “I was in Jaipur watching a match in which he was playing. They lost the match by a run and as a captain, I saw him almost crying and I liked that about him. He is a very nice guy, down-to-earth, disciplined, but you can expect only that much from him. I feel that God gave me my father instead of him.”

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In her recently released book, Sach Kahu Toh, Neena Gupta had revealed that there was a time when Vivian and Neena went five years without speaking to each other. The actor had revealed she and Masaba had planned a trip to meet Vivian. However, she had to cancel at the last minute because the dates of the trip were coinciding with an interview with the main trustee of Jamnabai Narsee School, in connection with Masaba’s school admission.

“Vivian didn’t understand the importance of it. Or maybe I wasn’t clear enough in explaining to him how difficult it was for a child in this situation to get admission in a good school. He thought I wasn’t serious about meeting him and was just making an excuse to drop out. This wasn’t the case at all. He hung up on me, dismissive, and angry, and didn’t call me again for five years,” she wrote.