Anurag Singh (director)

Anurag Singh was born in Jalandhar, Punjab, into a family of professors. Singh, a medical student, travelled to Australia to study film. He grew up in Jalandhar and is currently living in Mumbai, Maharashtra.

He married his childhood sweetheart Madhurjeet Sarghi, a theatre artist and actress who also hails from Jalandhar.^[2] In 2016, Singh and Sarghi had a child together.

During his early career, he assisted Bollywood director Raj Kanwar for several years before directing a Bollywood film of his own for Kanwar's production house. The film Raqeeb starring Jimmy Shergill, Sharman Joshi, and Tanushree Dutta was a commercial letdown. ^[3] Upon release, it received mixed-to-negative reviews and was a box office flop.^[4]

Singh began working in Punjabi cinema and directed his debut film Yaar Annmulle with actor Arya Babbar in the lead role. The coming of age comedy film emerged as a breakout project for Singh as it was declared a 'hit' by Box Office India. He established himself in Pollywood with the movie Jatt & Juliet in 2012.^[5][6] Starring Diljit Dosanjh and Neeru Bajwa, it followed the rivalry and eventual friendship of the two characters played by the pair of actors, while navigating foreign life. The romantic comedy turned out to be a blockbuster and emerged as the highest grossing Punjabi film up to that point. It was also awarded several accolades.^[7][8]

Following the success of Jatt & Juliet, he worked exclusively with Diljit Dosanjh in several films in the Punjabi language, which achieved record-breaking success, including the comedies Jatt & Juliet 2 (2013) and Disco Singh (2014),^[9][10] the period drama Punjab 1984 (2014),^[11] and the superhero comedy Super Singh (2017).^[12] He also produced Shadaa (2019) starring Dosanjh, another major success.^[13] These films won him the PTC Punjabi Film Award for Best Director three times. His film Punjab 1984 won the Best Feature Film in Punjabi award at 62nd National Film Awards.^{[14][15][16][17][18][19]}

Singh made his return to Bollywood with the 2019 war film Kesari, which is based on the historic Battle of Saragarhi.^[20] The film featured Akshay Kumar and Parineeti Chopra in the lead roles, supported by an ensemble cast, and was co-produced by Karan Johar and Zee Studios.^[21] Upon its release, Kesari received mixed reviews^[22] but achieved significant commercial success. It earned ₹201 crore and became the highest-grossing film of Singh's career.^[23][24]

In 2021, he produced the Punjabi romantic comedy Puaada, starring Ammy Virk and Sonam Bajwa. Similar to his previous films, it was well received, and became the first Indian box office hit of the year following the COVID-19 pandemic.^[25] In 2022, he penned the story for Bollywood film Jugjugg Jeeyo.^[26]

Singh next directed Border 2, the sequel to the cult classic Border (1997).^[27] It stars Sunny Deol, who was previously offered the lead role in Kesari (2019), but turned it down.^[28] It also features Varun Dhawan, Diljit Dosanjh, and Ahan Shetty, marking Dosanjh's first collaboration with Singh since Shadaa (2019).^[29][30]

Assistant director

• Ab Ke Baras (2002)
• Andaaz (2003)
• Humko Deewana Kar Gaye (2006)