The BBC One soap has cast Bharti Patel, best known for her acclaimed role as Ruhma Carter in BBC medical soap Doctors<\/a> from 2015 to 2024.<\/p>\n Patel arrives on-screen in EastEnders next week in a guest role as Maya Houssain, an unexpected new friend of Harvey Monroe (Ross Boatman).<\/p>\n Next week, Harvey will be seen feeling lonely \u2013 not surprising following the departures of best friends Mitch Baker (Roger Griffiths) and Tom \u201cRocky\u201d Cotton (Brian Conley).<\/p>\n Harvey\u2019s partner Jean Slater (Gillian Wright) will encourage him to try making some new friends.<\/p>\n As the week continues, Harvey unexpectedly bumps into a woman named Maya and offers to take her cab fare and help her. The pair then form a connection over being huge fans of football team Tottenham Hotspur.<\/p>\n Later in the week, the pair will bond even more over their love of the beautiful game and it seems they each have made a new friend.<\/p>\n However, is Maya merely a new friend for Harvey or is there more to her than meets the eye? And how will Jean and the Slaters react to Harvey\u2019s new friendship?<\/p>\n Read more:<\/strong><\/p>\n EastEnders airs Monday to Thursday on BBC One and BBC iPlayer.\u00a0<\/strong>Visit our dedicated\u00a0<\/strong>EastEnders<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0page for all the latest news, interviews and spoilers.<\/strong><\/p>\n Check out more of our\u00a0<\/strong>Soaps<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0coverage or visit our\u00a0<\/strong>TV Guide<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0<\/strong>Streaming Guide<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0to find out what else is on. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to\u00a0<\/strong>The Radio Times Podcast<\/strong><\/a>.<\/strong><\/p> <\/body><\/html>\n Actress Bharti Patel will portray Maya Houssain in the soap. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":51791,"template":"","categories":[1,2,5],"acf":[],"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2024\/05\/eastenders-casts-doctors-legend-bharti-patel-in-harvey-monroe-loneliness-story-scaled.jpg",2560,1707,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2024\/05\/eastenders-casts-doctors-legend-bharti-patel-in-harvey-monroe-loneliness-story-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2024\/05\/eastenders-casts-doctors-legend-bharti-patel-in-harvey-monroe-loneliness-story-300x200.jpg",300,200,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2024\/05\/eastenders-casts-doctors-legend-bharti-patel-in-harvey-monroe-loneliness-story-768x512.jpg",768,512,true],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2024\/05\/eastenders-casts-doctors-legend-bharti-patel-in-harvey-monroe-loneliness-story-1024x683.jpg",800,534,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2024\/05\/eastenders-casts-doctors-legend-bharti-patel-in-harvey-monroe-loneliness-story-1536x1024.jpg",1536,1024,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2024\/05\/eastenders-casts-doctors-legend-bharti-patel-in-harvey-monroe-loneliness-story-2048x1365.jpg",2048,1365,true]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"Actress Bharti Patel will portray Maya Houssain in the soap.","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed\/51790"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/rss_feed"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/51791"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51790"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51790"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Bharti](\"https:\/\/images.immediate.co.uk\/production\/volatile\/sites\/3\/2024\/05\/476738-8e3a32b.jpg?quality=90&resize=620%2C413\" "\\"476738,EastEnders\\"\/")
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