She married a much older man named Dr. Gajanan Yeshwant Chitnis at the age of 15 or 16, and quickly had four children. The couple supported India's struggle for independence from Britain and once risked arrest by harbouring Manabendra Nath Roy, a Marxist freedom fighter. After she divorced her husband, she worked as a school teacher and began acting on stage in melodramas typical of the time. She appeared in several movies, and went through a Bombay university to be hired by a major studio, Bombay Talkies; it hired only college graduates.