1998–2010
Kalidas first appeared on screen in the drama Googleyes. She went on to play Usha in a short film called Jump Boy in 1998, directed by Menhaj Huda and written by Harsha Patel. After a number of parts in films and on television, including East is East, Bollywood Queen, My Family and Casualty, in 2002 she appeared as Monica in Gurinder Chadha's film Bend It Like Beckham. She then played the female lead Priya in the Andrew Lloyd Webber-produced show Bombay Dreams, written by A.R. Rahman, Meera Syal and Don Black. She also appeared in the BBC Television series Bodies as Dr. Maya Dutta.
In 2007, Kalidas landed the female lead in a West End revival of Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice's Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. Appearing as the narrator, she performed with Lee Mead, who won the title role of Joseph in BBC One's Any Dream Will Do talent search series. The same year, she appeared in the multi-award-winning Channel 4 miniseries Britz. In 2009, Kalidas appeared in the second series of BBC One's Mistresses, and joined EastEnders in April of that year as Amira Shah, the girlfriend, and later wife of Syed Masood. In January 2010, she decided to quit EastEnders to pursue a pop career. Her final episode was broadcast on 26 April 2010. In July 2011, Kalidas revealed that she would be returning to EastEnders in the latter part of 2011. Kalidas, then left the show in March 2012. In September 2012, it was announced that Kalidas was returning to EastEnders briefly to conclude with the departures of Marc Elliott and John Partridge who play Syed Masood and Christian Clarke respectively.
Kalidas appeared in Hotel Babylon as Aisha Chaudhri, the daughter of a rich Indian hotel owner. She also appeared in the music video "Love Is Blind" by Ramzi featuring Ash King. In December 2009, she played the part of Leanne in ITV comedy drama Mister Eleven. She starred in the 2010 Chris Morris feature film Four Lions playing Sofia, the wife of protagonist Omar (played by Riz Ahmed). The film was released on 7 May.
After leaving EastEnders, Kalidas began to pursue a career in music, signing a record deal with Universal Records. Her second single, "Shimmy", featuring Mumzy Stranger, was released on 26 July 2010. Kalidas appeared on several programmes including the National Lottery Results and Loose Women in promotion of the single. The single received mixed reviews. Ruth Harrison from FemaleFirst stated that she "liked the single" but was not keen on the genre of music.
Kalidas stated in an interview with Digital Spy that her album would consist of a variety of genres. She also confirmed that the album would include collaborations with Bashy, Skepta, Schorcer, Ramzi and Mumzy Stranger. Kalidas' collaboration with Skepta, "Cross My Heart", was released in October 2010 as the lead single from Skepta's second studio album, Doin' It Again, however, at the time of release, Kalidas firmly stated its inclusion on her debut album.
