Enter Dubai’s flamboyant producer Rajan, drama-saver. “He was uncomfortable, he was crying,” Lall remembers. “Sanjeev Kumar had come home and Jagjit Singh and I were discussing it till late in the morning. Money was not an issue. But Mahesh narrated the story to Sanjeev and he decided to do the film next day.”
Rajan wasn’t having it. “I called Mahesh down,” he says. “I said, Mahesh, you better come. Rajan, but you know, you committed to Haribhai, and he’s a star. Eventually we all prevailed upon him, in spite of him.”
Kher now laughs at his meltdown. “My grandfather used to say, if you want to be equal with anybody in the world, just don’t expect anything from the person. Now I can say anything to him, so I cursed him!” He shrugs. “Truth is sometimes very empowering. I still speak my mind out whether it’s popular or not. I need to be popular with myself, then with the rest of the world.”
Mahesh blinked first. Ten days before shooting, the part was Kher’s again. Saaransh dropped in 1984 and—boom—Anupam Kher was everywhere. Sanjeev Kumar even watched the film alone and later admitted, “I couldn’t have done this role.”
Rajan’s pad was the original Bollywood after-hours lounge.
“They used to stay till four in the morning. I don’t drink—I’m a teetotaler,” he laughs.
“Teetotaler among raging, high-functioning alcoholics!” Kher shoots back.
Kher still lives by the lesson of Saaransh. “I was 28, playing a 65-year-old man,” he says. “Five minutes before the shoot I asked Mahesh, what is that one quality this character has? He said compassion. That compassion has stayed with me.”
Fast forward 41 years and the circle is deliciously complete. Anupam Kher is in Dubai to promote his new film Tanvi The Great, and guess who’s hosting the splashy screening? None other than Rajan Lall.
And because these two can’t resist a style moment, Rajan rolls in wearing a flamboyant pink-striped suit with glossy leather shoes, while Kher promptly steals his sharp jacket for photos. Fashion policing? Forget it—this is friendship couture.
Rajan plays it modest: “I was only a catalyst,” he insists. But let’s be real—without that late-night lobby ambush in a Mumbai apartment block, the world might never have witnessed Kher’s powerhouse debut.
Friendship. Compassion. Conviction. Saaransh delivered all three.
And as Dubai applauds Tanvi The Great these two prove that some friendships don’t fade—they just wait for the next fabulous sequel.
Read our full interview with Anupam Kher and Shubangi Dutt soon
Manjusha Radhakrishnan has been slaying entertainment news and celebrity interviews in Dubai for 18 years—and she’s just getting started. As Entertainment Editor, she covers Bollywood movie reviews, Hollywood scoops, Pakistani dramas, and world cinema.
Red carpets? She’s walked them all—Europe, North America, Macau—covering IIFA (Bollywood Oscars) and Zee Cine Awards like a pro. She’s been on CNN with Becky Anderson dropping Bollywood truth bombs like Salman Khan Black Buck hunting conviction and hosted panels with directors like Bollywood’s Kabir Khan and Indian cricketer Harbhajan Singh. She has also covered film festivals around the globe.
Oh, and did we mention she landed the cover of Xpedition Magazine as one of the UAE’s 50 most influential icons?
She was also the resident Bollywood guru on Dubai TV’s Insider Arabia and Saudi TV, where she dishes out the latest scoop and celebrity news. Her interview roster reads like a dream guest list—Priyanka Chopra Jonas, Shah Rukh Khan, Robbie Williams, Sean Penn, Deepika Padukone, Alia Bhatt, Joaquin Phoenix, and Morgan Freeman.
From breaking celeb news to making stars spill secrets, Manjusha doesn’t just cover entertainment—she owns it while looking like a star herself.