Nikhil Mahajan

Mahajan was born on 21 July 1984 in Aurangabad, Maharashtra. He grew up in an academic family; both of his parents were academics. He later moved to Australia to pursue formal education in filmmaking and graduated from Sydney Film School.^[4]

Mahajan married actress Mrinmayee Godbole in a registered marriage in Pune on 21 February 2017. The couple opted for a simple ceremony attended by family members and close friends.^[5]

After completing his film education in Australia, he returned to India and began working in the film industry. He made his feature-film directorial debut with the Marathi neo-noir thriller Pune 52, which was released in 2013. The film starred Girish Kulkarni, Sonali Kulkarni and Sai Tamhankar.^[6] He received the Maharashtra State Film Award for Best Debut Director for the film.^[7] He subsequently directed the Marathi action film Baji, released in 2015.^[8] He later expanded his work as a writer, contributing to films directed by other filmmakers. He was one of the writers of the Marathi coming-of-age film June (2021), for which he received a Filmfare Marathi nomination for Best Screenplay.^[9] In 2020, Mahajan made his streaming debut as one of the directors of the Netflix horror series Betaal, which he co-directed with Patrick Graham.^[10]

In 2021, Mahajan directed Godavari, a Marathi drama set in Nashik on the banks of the Godavari River.^[11] The film starred Jitendra Joshi, Neena Kulkarni, Vikram Gokhale, Gauri Nalawade and Priyadarshan Jadhav.^[12] Godavari was selected for the Indian Panorama section of the 52nd International Film Festival of India and won the Special Jury Award at the festival for Mahajan.^[13] Godavari became his most acclaimed directorial work. He won the National Film Award for Best Direction for the film at the 69th National Film Awards.^[14] He also won the Filmfare Marathi Award for Best Director and the Filmfare Marathi Award for Best Screenplay, which he shared with Prajakt Deshmukh.^[15] At the 59th Maharashtra State Film Awards, Godavari also earned Mahajan the Best Director award.^[16] In 2023, Mahajan wrote and directed the Hindi romantic thriller I Love You, starring Rakul Preet Singh, Pavail Gulati and Akshay Oberoi. The film was released directly on JioCinema.^[17] He subsequently worked on the Marathi film Raavsaaheb (2024), serving as its writer and director.^[18] He also continued his work as a screenwriter, including Tighee, released in 2026, for which he is credited with the screenplay.^[19]

Films

More information Year, Title ...

Year	Title	Director	Writer	Producer	Notes
2013	Pune 52	Yes	Yes	No	Maharashtra State Film Award for Best Debut Director
2015	Baji	Yes	Yes	Yes	[20]
2021	June	No	Yes	Yes	Maharashtra State Film Award for Best Debut Production[21]
	Godavari	Yes	Yes	Yes	National Film Award for Best Direction[22][23]
2022	Topaz	No	Yes	No
2023	I Love You	Yes	Yes	No	[24]
2024	Raavsaheb	No	Yes	No	[25]
2025	Mongoose	No	Yes	No	[26]
2026	Tighee	No	Yes	Yes	[27]

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Television

More information Year, Title ...

Year	Title	Notes	Ref.
2020	Betaal	Television debut as a director	[2]

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Theatre

More information Year, Title ...

Year	Title	Notes	Ref.
2019	Sakharam B.	Theatre debut as a writer	[28]

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