The team of A Random Desi Romance - Credit: WireImage/Getty for TIFF Check the press conference.

Maneesh Sharma / Director

The prolific director Maneesh Sharma was born and grew up in New Delhi (India). He did his schooling at Delhi Public School, R K Puram and graduated with Honors in English from Hans Raj College. In college, he was the President of the Dramatics Society and was avidly involved with English and Hindi theatre. Maneesh was also involved with various very sought after dance musicals of the Delhi Music Theatre.

Before moving to Mumbai in 2005, Maneesh pursued theatre for 7 years and went to the California Institute of the Arts where he pursued a MFA in Film Direction. He has four short films – Ek Pal, A New Awakening, and Sifar and Sharma Image to his credit and has been with Yash Raj Films as an assistant director on Fanaa (2006) and an associate director on Aaja Nachle (2007) and Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi (2008).

Maneesh made his directorial debut with Band Baaja Baaraat in 2010 and won the country’s top film awards for the best debut director including the Filmfare Award, Screen Award, Apsara Award and the FICCI Frames Award. His second directorial venture Ladies vs Ricky Bahl, starring Ranveer Singh and Anuskha Sharma hit cinemas worldwide on 9^th December 2011 and received popular acclaim. A Random Desi Romance Actress Parineeti Chopra debuted in ‘Ladies vs Ricky Bahl’ and won 16 awards.

His new film A Random Desi Romance is a fresh and very real love story about the hair raising minefield between love, attraction and commitment. A romantic comedy that finally tells it like it is!

Synopsis

A Random Desi Romance is the journey of three restless young people who junk the society's syllabus for finding love and decide to follow their heart.

Raghu (Sushant Singh Rajput), a tourist guide in Jaipur, wants a love in his life, and that's it. The rest he's going to figure out along the way.

Gayatri (Parineeti Chopra), a part-time instructor in an English speaking institute, has been around the block a few times and knows the scene, warts and all.

Tara (Vaani Kapoor), who's dying to get out there and fly, knows what's right for her, but a little experimenting never hurt anybody, did it?

When their lives crisscross, their beliefs get challenged, and their loves, tested.

We all want it all...the love, the attraction, the relationship, the commitment.

But when we get it, it may not be in the way we recognise.

From the director of Band Baaja Baaraat and the writer of Chak De! India, comes a very real love story about the hair raising minefield between love, attraction and commitment.

A Random Desi Romance: a romantic comedy which tells it like it is; and like it isn't.

Character Descriptions

Raghu (Sushant Singh Rajput)
A tourist guide in Jaipur, wants a love in his life, and that's it. The rest he's going to figure out along the way.

Gayatri (Parineeti Chopra)
A part-time instructor in an English speaking institute, has been around the block a few times and knows the scene, warts and all.

Tara (Vaani Kapoor)
Who's dying to get out there and fly, knows what's right for her, but a little experimenting never hurt anybody, did it?

Sushant Singh Rajput / Actor

The last few years have been a successful year for Indian actors and now global audiences are taking a closer look at India’s wealth of talented actors. Sushant Singh Rajput is the star of A Random Desi Romance, which screens in the Gala Presentation section of the Toronto International Film Festival. He launched his acting career on Indian television. Since debuting on the silver screen earlier this year, the young actor has watched his career explode.

Kai po che, Sushant’s first film, premiered this year at the Berlin International Film Festival (Berlinale) and screened at the Osaka Asian Film Festival in Japan. The film is based on a story by Chetan Bhagat, a journalist with the Times of India and the biggest selling English-language novelist in India, according to the New York Times. Bhagat was recently named one of the 100 most influential people by Time magazine.

The film has been released in India, USA, UK, Singapore, New Zealand and around the world. Last spring, the film played in limited release in North America and took in more than US $552,765 at the box office its opening weekend.

Shuddh Desi Romance finds this handsome 1.83m tall actor carrying his first feature film. In his next film, the actor plays alongside film legend Aamir Khan—star and co-producer of the Oscar-nominated film Lagaan: Once Upon a Time in India.

PARINEETI CHOPRA / Actress

Parineeti Chopra is an Indian film actor. Post a Finance degree from Manchester Business School, UK  and a stint in Banking, Parineeti joined Marketing & PR at Yash Raj Films before making her successful supporting role debut in 2011 in Yash Raj Films’ Ladies Vs Ricky Bahl. This was followed with an impressive lead role performance in YRF’s Ishaqzaade – she even earned a National Award mention for her role.

Just over 2 films old, Parineeti has won nearly 18 awards already which goes to prove her prowess as a fine actress.

Her next film is YRF’s A Random Desi Romance – A very contemporary and fresh take on love, romance and relationships.  Directed by Maneesh Sharma, written by Jaideep Sahni and produced by Aditya Chopra.

JAIDEEP SAHNI / Screenwriter

Jaideep Sahni is a screenwriter-lyricist in the Hindi film industry, having scripted films like Rocket Singh: Salesman of the Year, Chak De! India ,Company, Bunty Aur Babli, and Khosla Ka Ghosla, which he creative-produced too.

He was also been the lyricist for most of the above films, as well as for many others like Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi, Salaam Namaste, Bluffmaster, Johny Gaddaar, Tere Bin Laden, Company, Bollywood-Hollywood, and for music albums of artists like Euphoria and Shubha Mudgal.

His upcoming work is the script and lyrics of the film Shuddh Desi Romance, directed by Maneesh Sharma, produced by Yash Raj Films.

After graduating as a computer engineer, he worked in IT consulting and advertising before turning a full time screenwriter, lyricist and creative producer.