Aishwarya Rai Bachchan or Aishwarya Bachchan (Birthname: Aishwarya Rai; born November 1, 1973) is an internationally known Indian actress. Before starting her career as an actress, she worked as a model, and gained fame after winning the Miss World contest in 1994.

Often touted as the most beautiful woman in the world, Rai made her movie debut in Mani Ratnam's Tamil film, Iruvar (1997). She had her first commercial success in the Tamil movie Jeans (1998) She came to the attention of Bollywood in the Hindi movie, Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam (1999), which was directed by Sanjay Leela Bhansali. She successfully performed again in Bhansali's Devdas (2002). Since then, she has acted in nearly forty movies in Hindi, Tamil, Bengali, and English, including the international movies, Bride & Prejudice (2003) and The Last Legion (2007) in English.