What made Prakash Jha choose you?
I think he liked my enthusiasm. He said yes to the project because he knew the risk involved was not very high. He has his own set of values for cinema today. But I must say that he did not give me a go ahead after reading the script. He asked me to shoot about 10 scenes with a digital camera. I contacted all the actors — Shreyas Talpade, Smriti Mishra [Images], Imaad Shah and Ishita Sharma — who did the scenes for free. After seeing them, Prakash Jha was convinced. What is Dil Dosti Etc about? On the surface, it is about students in Delhi University and their different concerns and ambitions. Sanjay Mishra (Shreyas Talpade [Images]) is a middle class guy from Bihar, who makes friends with the cosmopolitan and extremely rich guy Apurv (Imaad Shah). They have different value systems. For me, there are the two India’s — the conservative and the modern. How was it working with Shreyas and Imaad? I had no particular actor in mind when I was writing my script. I spotted Imaad in a Polo a
