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Regular-article-logo Sunday, 13 July 2025

Turning to crime

Piyush Jha has switched course from making ad films to feature movies and he's now also writing crime novellas

TT Bureau Published 28.02.16, 12:00 AM
Photo: Gajanan Dudhalkar

From ad film-making to writing crime novels has been quite a journey for me. I began my career in 1995 with the ad agency Trikaya Grey, now called Grey Worldwide, where I worked in both the account planning and client servicing departments. A year later I joined the DDB Mudra Group where I set up a film department. This was a turning point as it got me hooked to film-making.

Soon I realised that if I wanted to grow as an ad filmmaker I had to turn independent producer. So, in the early 2000s, I started my own company to produce ad films.

Soon I began to feel jaded and when a friend suggested that I try my hand at making feature films, I warmed to the idea. On a mere whim one day, I contacted the chief of the National Film Development Corporation of India (NFDC) and within a month landed the approval for my movie script. My film Chalo America for NFDC released in 2000 proving to be a milestone in my career.

Then I directed King of Bollywood (2004), which featured Om Puri and British supermodel Sophie Dahl. But it was my third film, Sikandar (2009), a social commentary that got me acclaim. The movie went on to be nominated in two categories at the Star Screen Awards 2010 which also proved to be a significant milestone. For I met Priyanka Sinha Jha, the editor of the film magazine Screen — who I ended up marrying!

Though I had a creative bent of mind from my childhood, I never really wrote in my growing up years. For, after I graduated in Psychology from Mithibai College in Mumbai, I did my MBA from K.J. Somaiya Institute of Management Studies & Research, Mumbai, and immediately plunged into the ad world.

So, writing crime novellas never crossed my mind. But when I turned author it happened quite by chance. In 2011, I had set out to write a screenplay but ended up writing crime stories. They morphed into three novellas which I compiled as one book. Titled Mumbaistan (2012), it was published by Rupa. My next two books were Compass Box Killer: An Inspector Virkar Crime Thriller (2013) and Anti-Social Network: An Inspector Virkar Crime Thriller (2014).

My latest title Raakshas: India’s No. 1 Serial Killer from Westland was released in January this year.

Today, I am juggling film-making with writing. On the anvil is my next film which will be a crime thriller. Also, I will be conceptualising, writing and creating a crime-based television show, while one of my books will be turned into a Web series and will also be telecast on television this year.

(As told to Susmita Saha)

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