Valentine's Day, this year, is a day of double celebration for actor-couple Prateik Smita Patil and Priya Banerjee Patil, as it marks their first wedding anniversary. Ahead of the special moment, the couple recalls Prateik’s dreamy and “unexpected” proposal on Propose Day, today.

“I had planned to propose to Priya at the stroke of midnight on the eve of my birthday, November 28. But we had work the next morning, so we wouldn’t have had time to enjoy the moment,” Prateik recalls, adding, “Then two days before, on a Sunday morning, I was sitting on my ‘throne’ in the bathroom, where I get some of my best ideas, and realized we had the whole day to ourselves. It was the perfect day to propose.”

On November 26, 2024, after five years of living together, Prateik went for it. “It was 8 am, and I saw him crying in the corner. I was lying in bed with our dog when he suddenly came next to me and proposed,” Priya gushes. “He was so emotional that I didn’t even understand the first question he asked me,” she adds.

“He went down on one knee in his boxers. Our dog was there too, wagging his tail—it was a celebration with the three of us,” she says. While Priya suspected a proposal was coming since Prateik had spoken to her parents, the timing caught her off guard. “I’m glad he did it the day I expected it the least,” says Priya.