Aishwarya Rai, or Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, covers the new issue of Vogue India. I’ve written about the lovely Aishwarya before – she’s sort of the Angelina Jolie of Bollywood, she’s been called one of the most beautiful women in the world, and she’s married to an equally famous Bollywood actor named Abhishek Bachchan. They had a baby girl in 2011, and Aishwarya was criticized for not losing the “baby weight” fast enough, because people are mean and stupid.

I wanted to cover this because… BANGS. Aishwarya “went away” for several years during and after her pregnancy, only making some paid appearances in Cannes on behalf of her beauty-campaign contracts. This Vogue India cover marks a “comeback” of sorts. She’s 41 years old and ready to work again. And so we’re seeing a whole new Aishwarya. With BANGS. She’s still a beautiful woman, of course, but these bangs do absolutely nothing for her. She has a round face, and the bangs make her face look even rounder.

As for Aish’s big “comeback,” this is what she has to say about it with Vogue India:

Comeback? What a strange word. Comebacks are for people who cashed in their cheques, switched off the bright lights, retired to the Bahamas, and then sheepishly snuck back in realising they still had a little gas in the tank for one more. Why, she never went away. “Yes, there was a maternity leave, just like any other working woman—in fact, I was working right up to my sixth month, with my various product endorsements and other stuff. There were no movies, obviously,” she says.

There were no movies, no, but we do remember seeing that exquisite partum glow on her cheeks as she tossed her hair for L’Oreal. “Yes, and the UNAIDS work carried on as well. They had approached me way back in 2001, and I had declined it then; there was too much going on at the time for me to do justice to it. I wanted to be more than just a pretty face issuing PSAs; I wanted to be hands on. Almost 12 years later, this seemed like the perfect time. Then there were the endless meetings to ideate new things, future movie roles, more and more brands…” she smiles, as if to reiterate, “What comeback?”

[From Vogue India]

I wonder if she will still have a thriving acting career now. Now that she’s a mother, now that she’s over 40, now that Bollywood changes by the moment. I have no doubt she will still work, but it might not be in Indian films. She will still launch beauty campaigns, she will still be invited to Cannes, she will still get lots of modeling contracts. But let’s see how her comeback plays out. In the meantime… NO MORE BANGS.

Photos courtesy of Marc Hom/Vogue India.