When Pooja Gupta, a project engineer with a software company, received an intimation call from Mumbai Mirror to meet her favourite actor, Rajeev Khandelwal, she couldn't believe her ears.
Dismissing it as yet another prank her friends had been playing on her since her college days, she preferred not making a fool of her self this time around. In fact, she didn't confirm the meeting until she sneakily made a call from a landline number to check if it was really us.
Seeing Rajeev standing in front of her, she exclaimed, "Oh my god! My dream is coming true," beaming from ear to ear. She told Rajeev that her college friends teased her by calling her Kashish Garewal - the character from the TV serial Kahiin to Hoga (2003) - who was in love with Sujal Garewal, played by Rajeev. They also insisted on wishing her 'Happy Birthday' every year on October 16, which is Rajeev's birthday, to which he said laughing, "Its not a dream coming true, it's the bubble going bust." Having given hits on both TV and films, Pooja asked him if he was enjoying his career. He replied, "My journey has been beautiful. I am not embarrassed about anything I have done, so that's a good thing. If you do anything with conviction without getting influenced by the external world, there is no way that anyone can stop you. If you want to achieve something and you are focused and sincere about it, anything is possible."
He added, "Nothing is similar to what I have done in the past. There was Aamir and Soundtrack, now there is the upcoming romantic comedy Will You Marry Me? People are coming to me with roles that I hadn't dreamt of. That's a great feeling."
Pooja liked Rajeev's humility and the fact that he didn't act pricy just because he was an actor. She was surprised to hear that he didn't believe in God. "I am an agnostic. I won't stop you from praying but I won't thank God for giving me success or complain when things do not work out. My faith is my hard work. It doesn't lie in any idol. When I was struggling, I knew I had to get up in the morning and look for work. I was not hoping and praying to God that work would come find me. I am still struggling and enjoying my struggle," he said.
The soon-to-be-married Pooja then got to things a tad bit more personal. She curiously asked about his experience as a newly-married man himself (Rajeev married Manjiri Kamtikar just last year). He pondered for a moment and said, "People say that the first year is the most difficult. But it has passed smoothly for us. We have spent a lot of time together, travelled a lot abroad and within the country. The only way to accept the other person is the way he or she is. If you change the person or expect him or her to change for you, then the whole foundation goes wrong. We get irritated with each other, but never questioned each other - ki tum kahan the, ya thi?" (Where have you been?) He blushed when she told him that for the longest time, her email password was 'Rajeev Khandelwal'. He plucked a red coloured balloon from the wall, signed it and said, "This is from me. Mera dil aapke paas ja chukka hai."
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