Melbourne's new Moomba queen has done her research. Yes, Pallavi Sharda knows about the claim that has haunted Moomba since its inception -- that the name, rather than being Aboriginal for "let's get together and have fun", is actually an indigenous equivalent of "up yours!"

"I made the mistake of mentioning that to the lord mayor's driver and he was very offended," she says.

But that is what she loves about her native Australia. The Melbourne girl, who has broken into India's massive Bollywood industry, cherishes that Aussie irreverence, the freedom to shake the branches. It is something she consciously curbs in Mumbai where she is now based.

"If you are a free thinker over there you are really in the minority."

The only daughter of Indian-born professors, Pallavi is smart as a whip (she skipped year 9 so finished secondary school at 16, then galloped through a law/media degree with honours), warm and articulate. The 27-year-old with movie-star good looks is also a patriot who fiercely defends her homeland.

"I think we get a bad rap about racism," she says. "Being Australian and proudly so, I stick up for us and actually get into fights over it.

"I let one film go because the Indian producer insulted Australia. He had been filming here and claims he was given a really tough time by the authorities. When I told him I was Australian he asked me: 'Are you going to bash my crew up?' It was just after those student bashings that had been widely publicised."

It was not a happy basis on which to start so Pallavi backed out. "Dialogue is often not possible culturally in India, you either agree on something or you don't."

Pallavi Sharda was born in Perth after mother Hema and father Nalin migrated in the 1980s. They moved to Melbourne when she was a toddler and, as far back as she can remember, she was entranced by the swirling colour and movement of Bollywood, repeatedly watching the videos her family had brought with them from India.

However her professorial parents pushed her in a more scholastic direction.

"There was a lot of pressure there," she recalls. "I was pretty academic growing up. My father famously tells a story in his lectures that I could do logarithms when I was eight years old. But I tell him that was just because he made me learn. I went on to become very good at maths and science but then grew to dislike it intensely. I was surrounded by scientists and engineers at home and my father made everything into a mathematical question -- even in the car. 'If this car is going 70kmh and another car is coming at 70km and there is a collision, and the momentum is...' , that sort of thing. I found it extremely boring."

Then, at Lowther Hall girls school in Essendon, Pallavi discovered humanities and by year 12 she had rejected her mathematical genes. "I was probably the only child of the Indian diaspora who studied subjects like French and classical societies. I did zero maths and zero science that year, which is unheardof for Indian-Australians."

Pallavi has chosen the Boathouse restaurant by the Maribyrnong River for our lunch because her parents and brother Ankur have been coming here for years.

Manager Aydin Bol is delighted. He pushes "extras" upon us and it is hard work later to convince him to give us a bill. Pallavi – due to perform in the White Night the following weekend -- is cautious about over-eating but manages to polish off an arancini ball, salmon main course and a dessert. The Boathouse burger is enough for me.

Over the dacquoise with vanilla ice-cream, Pallavi recalls how she managed to get a foothold on the Bollywood ladder. In 2008 she suspended her studies at Melbourne University and flew to India, pacifying her parents by claiming she was "doing a masters" at a university in Delhi. In fact, she booked into a cheap guest house and began knocking on Bollywood doors. "I did not know anyone in Mumbai," she admits. "There were days I would be in a car packed with suitcases, not knowing where I was staying that night." However she had received one reply to emails she had sent from Australia and pursued that before returning to Melbourne to finish her degree. The upshot was that in December 2011 she won a role in the film Save Your Legs and her career was up and away.

This exercise in tenacity earned her inclusion in a Radio National series three months ago about "game-changers" who braved new frontiers. "Risking it all to chase a childhood dream", was the broadcaster's tag for Pallavi Sharda but there were a couple of ungracious snipes afterwards from listenerland. One asked if the public paid for the Bollywood star's university education and, if so, would the public get their money back? Another snarled that she would not have got to first base without good looks: that she merely "conformed to a particular valorised physical type".

In her early days on the Bollywood career ladder Pallavi would get upset by public criticism. "I suffer from people-pleasing syndrome," she says. "For example, I might wear a sari and someone won't like the colour – or says that so-and-so would have worn it better -- and I'd get upset. Twitter should be called Hater. It's a direct communication where people can hurl abuse. You really have to grow thick skin in the public eye. I've got to that stage now."

In India, she says, many people think it "very weird" that a Bollywood actress has a law degree. "But I think it is good to come to the arts with a different perspective," she says. It highlights the sharp cultural divide she has had to negotiate, she says – in India the general opinion is that a lawyer turning to Bollywood shows a "lack of focus" whereas in Australia, such mixed disciplines are applauded. "

As for her appearance, Pallavi says she does not fit the Bollywood template at all. "Just the opposite. I'm not fair enough, not tall enough, not thin enough, and I've had a hard time because of it. In India they think darker skin is not attractive. You are told not to tan. I'm often described as 'dusky" or 'wheatish'. There was a wave of catwalk models going into film when I arrived – all tall and fair. It is not so bad now."

Pallavi is revelling in her months back in her hometown and is full of praise for her fellow monarch Shane Warne. "Warnie has been charming and gracious. Of course he is a much larger celebrity than I'll ever be. He has a following everywhere. I'm very excited to be Moomba queen. I was so honoured to be considered Melburnian enough."