She is known for her roles as Shabnam Masood in the BBC One soap opera EastEnders (2014–2016) and Emily Sands in the Netflix comedy-drama Sex Education (2019–2023).

As a teenager, Thakrar became involved with Hathi Productions, a theatre club based in Leicester run by Jez Simons, her drama teacher, who has written for EastEnders.

[2] In 2004, Thakrar landed the role of Roopa Chauhan in the radio drama Silver Street, which was broadcast on the BBC Asian Network.

Thakrar went on to feature in a number of TV series including Doctors, Holby City, Peep Show and, notably, played a lead character in the British-Asian drama Cloud 9.

Run in conjunction with Leicester City Council, it enabled a team of young journalists to spend 10 months gaining an introduction to print journalism and reporting on their communities.