How did the concept of making a film like Delhi 6 come to your mind?

I don't know when and how it came to my mind. It must have evolved over a period of time. I dug into my childhood memories of people and ideas. It started as a story then it became a different story. I wanted to do a film about people and a place. It kind of kept evolving. It's been the most interesting ride of my life till now. As we went along, we wrote the first initial drafts with Kamlesh Pandey. From there I started writing it myself for a year and a half and then Prasoon Joshi came in and he gave the story a different turn, prospective and depth altogether. So it kept evolving and still evolving. Prasoon also wrote the lyrics and that also brought something to the story. Rahman and Bharti also interpreted the story in their own ways. The story and screenplay has been rewriting itself and it has been an organic and I have never come in its way to object. I let it grow and let it flow the way it wanted to.

What are you trying to show with Delhi 6?

In Delhi 6, it's the love for your place called Delhi, love for my childhood. I think as you grow older more you want to go back to your childhood, so maybe I am getting older. So many characters from people I know, my relatives, friends are depicted in this is a film. It's about people. Delhi 6 is synonymous to any small town in India. These small towns are the places where India belongs. The thought process comes from India which is rooted and is in the soil. Delhi 6 is also about these people, the ordinary Indians. It also dwells on the fact that it is a crazy and chaotic country. It has got so many religions they live in constant love hatred conflict and strife. There are different castes, festivals, political parties, beurocracy, grapevines. I just wanted to explore all this.

Why did you only choose Delhi as your subject to explore?

Delhi is, as I said symbolic as I know Delhi but it's about the whole India and its culture. I know Delhi 6, so I could relate and define better. It's a story about people and not a place. It is a story about Roshan aka Abhishek Bachchan whose grandmother is ailing and wants to die in the land she belongs to. He is not an Indian. He is an American so she brings her back to India. So it's a story about an old lady who wants to go back to her land to die peacefully. In this journey he meets different people and Delhi 6 is all about those people. It's not the story on Delhi but it about the people and events that happen in that place.

Tell us something about Sonam's character in this film?

Bittu (Sonam Kapoor) is a middle class girl. She is lovely and vivacious beautiful Indian beauty. She has got her fears and conflicts like any middle class girl. She doesn't want to end up being Mrs Daddy'ss right choice. She doesn't want to end up being like her aunts and mother. She doesn't want to end up in a household chores. She wants to explore her own thinking, belief and wants to spread her wings and that's symbolic to the dove which flies.

How was the experience working with Sonam and Abhishek?

It was a pleasure. Abhi is a friend of mine I know him from last 10 years. We knew each other and wanted to work with each other. We were going to do our debut film together but it did not happen. We tried to make it for good 3 4 years but it was not meant to be. Since then I had approached him for Rang De Basanti, but he was busy at that time. Then I approached him for Delhi 6 but again had to withdraw as the dates did not match but then again came back and got him on board for Delhi 6. So it was a very emotional moment on the first day of shooting. After taking the first shot I did not even look at him as I was scared that one of us would break down. Sonam has been a revelation. I had never expected Sonam or the girl who was playing Bittus character to bring this to the role. It is beyond my wildest imagination. She has gone into the role, interpreted it, she brought in her own actors workshop into it and given it a new and different dimension to it. This is what one demands from an actor and I am sure she has been very well trained by her father.

How did you manage to shoot in a crowded city like Delhi?

We shot a good 20 25% in Delhi while the rest of the film was shot in a place called Sambar which is a small town around 2 to 3 hours away from Jaipur. It's architecture is very close to Delhi. The gully, mohallas was very close to Delhi, so we could shoot there very peacefully. If I was to do all that in Delhi we had to stop the lives of the people, we would disturb every one, business, children who study, old people who sleep early, shop keepers, traffic, etc. So we did not want to do that and stop and disturb some ones daily life. We can do it for a day or two but not more than that. We did it for 20 days in the blocks of 4 to 5 days. I could not do it for 5 months. We went nuts finding a place like Delhi; we travelled almost 5 times all over the country till we found Sambar. It took us 1 year finding this place.