The actor’s Instagram handle reveals his love for poetry, writing and Sufism
Jane Borges (MID-DAY; April 23, 2017)

When you think Arunoday Singh, the first thing that conjures in this writer’s mind is tall, handsome and excessively charming. You could blame cinema for this inadequate comprehension of the actor, or, may be, our permanent hangover of his role as the classy and suave Dhruv Singh from Aisha (2010). Either way, we can’t deny that there’s only this much that celluloid shows us.

So, when we stumbled upon the actor’s poetry on his Instagram feed, where he goes by the handle @sufisoul, there is a brief moment of disbelief. “Sometimes you take my breath away,” he writes in one post in bold, decorative script, “… Sometimes you even forget I need it back.” Hooked, we slide further, where amid the pile of verse and poetry, we find the actor’s motivation. “I so often say the wrong things. I became a poet, to say the right ones, in the right way, at least some of the time,” he writes.

It wouldn’t be wrong to say that a major chunk of Singh’s followers on Instagram, which stands at nearly 43,000, are here not to voyeuristically follow his pursuit to stardom or his selfie-moments, but to read his poetry. With posts flooded with hashtags #poetsofinstagram and #sufisoulpoetry, Singh also, appears to be rather intermittently posting photographs of his Canadian wife Lee Elton, his travels and two dogs. “I have been writing since puberty,” Singh says, during a telephonic interview. “It actually stemmed from my fascination for rock ‘n’ roll music as a teen. I had just begun noticing girls and was also listening to songs about girls, so, it just seemed like the cool thing to do,” the actor recalls.

“But, the people I admired the most, were always the people who wrote well. So, though it started of as a whim, for reasons, I just kept at it. Eventually, writing became a necessity.” The more he saw of the world, the better his writing got, he says. “Experience just kept feeding fire. It, however, came with a lot of practise. I started out writing the most dreadful poetry, ever written down on paper. Those books have been burnt, the ashes buried and a large golem erected to protect the site,” he jokes.

A few years ago, the actor decided to reach out to other poetry enthusiasts with his work. “I began on Instagram with 10 followers posting my hand-written verses. I soon figured that it was a great space to share poetry. When somebody reads and likes what you write, it means for that second this person felt what I felt, and in that moment, we were both together,” he says.

Today, writing has become a habit — one that’s almost addictive. “I write all day. But, because of work, home chores, and now, marriage, the deep quiet of the night has become my favourite time to write. It’s become a meditation. It’s a way for me to order my thoughts, simplify complex feelings and understand myself better. It’s my prayer and religion. It makes me feel I am not alone,” he says.

Singh, who is deeply inspired by the works of Leonard Cohen, Jalaluddin Rumi and Kabir, likes to call himself a sufi — this also explains the name of his Instagram handle. “I find the essence of Sufism, which is the love for humanity, very alluring and correct. No other religion speaks to me like Sufism does. Every other religion reminds you that you are imperfect and that you have to strive to do better. But, Sufism makes you feel that imperfect was what you were supposed to be and that you are doing just fine.”

While acting keeps him busy, Singh also harbours a small dream. “I would love to publish my poetry… only for the feeling that I did it, and, that there is a book in the vast library of the world and it was written by me.”

Arunoday Singh who'll tie the knot in December recounts his love story with his Canadian fiancée
Sanyukta Iyer (MUMBAI MIRROR; November 28, 2016)


Two months ago, Arunoday Singh who was last seen as the antagonist in Ashutosh Gowariker's Hrithik Roshan-starrer Mohenjo Daro, found himself at the centre of a frenzy surrounding his impending nuptials with Lee Elton, his 29-year-old Canadian ladylove of three years, and was suitably stumped. "I'm not fabulously famous!" he exclaims, denying the rumours that it's going to be a grand wedding with 20,000 invites being sent out. "For me, a wedding is grand when the people who really know me and whom I share a close connection with are in attendance. Also, if I had the money to feed 20,000 people, I'd be producing films featuring myself," the actor jokes, adding that his fiancée is equally amused with the unsolicited "wedding of the year" status their D-Day has been accorded.

It's going to be an extremely intimate affair for the 33-year-old actor who comes from a prominent political family - he's the grandson of former Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Arjun Singh, while his real estate baron father, Ajay Singh, is a former Member of Parliament.

When contacted him Mirror on Sunday evening, Arunoday who was filming a Malayalee-Hindi bi-lingual with Mohanlal in a remote Rajasthan village, promised to speak as soon as he got out of his "period-drama-warlike costume".

The soon-to-be bridegroom came across as a composed adult, a far cry from his bratty turns on screen in films like Yeh Saali Zindagi and Aisha. "I've always been a committed person," he says, adding, "The popular perception is an extension of my film work, 'a media image' which I don't mind because Lee knows who I am at heart. For her, I'm a warrior lover with wild eyes, strong hands, and a poet's heart..."

Arunoday was in Goa in 2013 for a programme at the Ashiyana yoga retreat when he met Lee who was staying there. "We immediately knew there was a connection but I didn't want to get into some thing like that while on a retreat. So we became good friends and kept in touch," he says. At the time, he didn't know she was in Goa to open her own restaurant.

Since he was a frequent visitor to the tourist-state, they spent a lot of time together and were "girl friend-boyfriend" before they knew it. "She's the thandak to all my anxieties. She makes everything seem simple. We are also two sorted individuals who live independent lives - such a wonderfully good fit that I had no choice but to marry her," he beams.

When he was sure that Lee was the one for him, Arunoday decided to ask her father for her hand. When he asked Lee if he could accompany her home to Newfoundland, an island off the east coast of the Canadian mainland, to meet her family, she was stumped! "I'd got a break from Mohenjo Daro and decided to go away with Lee. Newfoundland is a gorgeous place and I loved spending time with her family. They gave their approval and at the end of our trip, I went down on one knee to propose to her, and she said 'yes'," the actor recalls.

While Newfoundland was all about hiking, food was at the centre of Lee's meeting with Arunoday's parents at their family home in Madhya Pradesh. She cooked several meals for the Singhs and the couple has since vacationed several times with his sisters - Ambika, a New York-based photographer, and Akriti, who is studying to become a teacher. "I come from a family of alphas. My sisters are my best friends and they are not easily impressed but took to Lee immediately. Now, they are constantly messaging her and discussing the wedding," Arunoday laughs.

Apart from Goa and their café, the couple have found common grounds in beaches, sunsets, healthy food, hiking and animals. Movie nights are usually packed with "cheesy horrors". Within the first 18 months of their courtship, Day and Lee have brought in Diwali in Goa, celebrated his 32nd birthday in Cambodia, visited his family for Dushehra in MP and witnessed her longstanding dream come true, the launch of her garden-restaurant Puttu Café in Vagator, Goa. And while Lee was working towards getting her café off the ground all through 2014, the couple also moved into a cozy, Portuguese-style bungalow with their two dogs, Lilu and Daaku.

The café opened for its first season in October 2015 and was up for a second run from October, 2016, when plans were put on hold, until 2017, because the duo is getting married in the next 20 days. “But the (wedding) dates doing the rounds are incorrect. It's in mid-December in a quiet place and we're not revealing any details,“ Arunoday clears the air.

Will he permanently move to Goa after the wedding? "Home is wherever Lee is. I live in Mumbai and she lives in Goa. I take off to meet her every time I sign on a new project. Goa and Lee are not my escape from Mumbai, but my reward. I take off with her only when I've earned it and that's how it will always remain for the both of us," he signs off.

Priya Gupta (BOMBAY TIMES; April 6, 2014)

Arunoday Singh, 31, is quite a gypsy, who loves to travel. He has eclectic interests and is freespirited and intelligent. He is hard-working when he needs to be, but is lazy otherwise and constantly needs someone to crack the whip on him. Over an hour-long conversation just before the release of his film Main Tera Hero, he spoke to Bombay Times about his evolved parents, the insightful Sudhir Mishra and why he would never marry an actress. Excerpts:

Being a senior Congress leader Arjun Singh’s grandson, why did you choose acting as a career choice?
I called my grandfather baba. My parents live in a village near Bhopal called Mendora. It is in the middle of nothing, where even the TV barely works and they like it that way. They have a dairy farm out there and my father has been into real estate. They have lived there from the time I was born. My dad used to manage my grandfather’s political campaigns and was naturally interested. After my grandfather passed away, my father took up the MLA seat for the area from where they are. My grandfather lived in Delhi but whenever he came to Bhopal, home was always sanctuary, the politics didn’t kind of make it past the gate. He went to office and all the meetings were there. He was very intelligent, watchful, quiet, thoughtful, committed, sweet and funny in almost a juvenile kind of way. I was amongst the few people who could make him giggle. I went to a boarding school, Kodaikanal International, from where I got a scholarship to do my graduation from Boston. Since I lived in a hostel, I was not that exposed to politics from the beginning. I was nine when my favourite English teacher was organising a screening of Marlon Brando’s On The Waterfront. It was not life-changing, but it was a really cool thing to see. I had never seen or paid attention to a film before that so much I was pathologically shy, but she threw me on stage and I realised that I could do what I wanted and yet not feel shy, even though there were 500 people, because I couldn’t see them. So my major extracurricular activity became theatre. I continued doing it in college and I realised that I could actually get paid for it and felt why not convert something you love so much into your profession. I also did quite a few odd jobs while I lived in New York like bouncing at a night club and voiceover work to sustain myself. I lived abroad till the age of 27 when I came back to India as visas got tougher to get. I am a bit of a gypsy and had lived in many countries till then. I didn’t think I would get work in India as I was not used to Bollywood. Also, I didn’t think they would have that much to do with me as my mental bent was western and my English doesn’t make people believe that I can speak Hindi. But I am comfortable with who I am and fortunately met Sudhir Mishra. He liked how I looked and got me my first break in Sikandar, after which I did Aisha, then Yeh Saali Zindagi, Jism 2 and now Main Tera Hero.

Were your parents supportive of your decision to join films versus politics?
They loved it as they know it makes me happy. And that is their only benchmark for success. They are wise enough to know that everything else will come and go, be it money or job satisfaction, but that the true measure of success in life is if you are genuinely, quietly happy in life. They are both very evolved as parents who believe that so long as you are doing what makes you happy and so long as it continues to make you happy and you are applying and growing your mind, they are fine. My parents both came from homes that were conservative which is why they are both not conservative. My father is the buffer for me and my two sisters. They were raised conservatively so they didn’t allow us to be. They told us, ‘Go and do whatever you want to. If it doesn’t work out come back home. Rethink it and go back again.’ They wanted us to have whatever opportunities we were interested in. My dad had got a full scholarship at California, being a gold medalist in Economics, but he was not allowed to take it up. He doesn’t regret it, but, of course, there is a part of him that wonders where life would have taken him had he gone there. Which is also why he always says, ‘Whenever you get the chance to be something, you owe it to yourself and to the person giving you the opportunity to take it.’ My parents like it that I am very eclectic as I like music, poetry, writing, acting and travelling. My mother is also very artistic. But since she came from a conservative household it was tolerated till she got married after which she did not get a chance to show her talent to the world. So she does it all in her home be it painting or sculpture and made her world as aesthetically beautiful as possible. But she too supported us to pursue our dreams.

What would your parents like to change about you?
I overthink things. My dad is a very capable man and will always tell me, ‘Why do you think so much? Why don’t you just do it?’ I keep evaluating the pros and cons and doing it to the point that I don’t start it and if I start, I don’t finish it. But I am nicely contradictory. Normally I think I do the overthinking but when it comes to a lot of things that really matter, I am delightfully impulsive. But I also know that if I don’t instantly jump in, then I can take a month to think and may finally not do it. The good thing is that I balance my overthinking with a dose of impulsiveness.

Are you dependent on your parents financially?
They are wealthy, but I have been independent for a while. I know if I need to take from them I can, but I don’t need to. Also I am very basic with my needs. I wear the same shoes for years and a white T-shirt and jeans is all I need. Now I have to invest in suits and all the rest, but I like eating at home. I am a really large, badly trained dog. I am actually quite basic and affectionate, but all my responses are very visceral and immediate. If I am angry I am angry, if I am sad I am sad, I have no layers and my mother says that I never got entirely civilised. I can play the part very well, I can cross my legs well, sit with my jacket just right.

Does marriage feature in your life?
It will, in the future. No one has the faith to see beyond what they see right now. Currently, nobody will have me, I am trouble and am woefully single even though in Mumbai I have this reputation of being a ladies’ man which I find amusing for the 10,000 lonely nights I have spent alone. I have had relationships, but there has been no life changing relationship so far, no great breakup either. I move a lot, travel a lot, so my girlfriends also have been travellers. I haven’t dated any actresses. I kind of find dating an actress trouble, as you can’t have two self-absorbed people in a relationship. Somebody needs to be normal and bring you back to earth. Somebody needs to take you out of your bubble. I have met some really lovely ones, but there is an instinct that says this will be fun, but I also know that there will inherently be too much competition in such a relationship. Also, all the lovely girls I know are already in relationships, be it Nargis Fakhri, Ileana D’Cruz and so many others.

Talk about Sudhir Mishra?
He is very intelligent, the kind of person you can talk to about anything under the sun. He can argue any side of the case, is a very good writer and encourages me to write as well. He is a rum character. The kind of person that is interestingly outspoken and brazen. They are the kind of people who don’t get angry when they are drunk, but become more fun. He is like that except that he doesn’t drink. He is one of the most insightful people I have met.

Do you get affected by a low period?
I don’t cry, but I brood. I write really bad poetry, stare at the beach and take long walks and get angry. I am very emotionally volcanic. My lowest point was the time between Yeh Saali Zindagi and Jism 2, as I just didn’t know where I fit in and didn’t know my place. It’s really tough when you are surrounded by people, who have already decided who and what you are. And the terrible thing is that you start to agree with their assessment of yourself. It’s a crime to do that to yourself, but it’s an easy trap to fall into Bollywood. You go through so many insecurities. It was good to go through that period and come out of it, as I didn’t realise till then that I was weak in that area. I am quite insular and self-sufficient otherwise. My parents are firm believers that you can ask for help and can talk it out as much as you want, but you finally have to help yourself. I spoke to my parents and it’s not that they said that you are best, but they will tell you things that you are potentially good at. They help you find your groove. They told me that there are success stories that happen overnight, but it’s not meant to happen to you. You need to work hard and work your way up and you should. I had to come out of it by facing the city and the industry and do your work and keep at it. Every parent is always concerned and they will never stop being concerned even when I am happy. I too am insecure. You are always wondering, watching gauging and that’s where the craft and magic comes from. But that is also the demon you have to keep the lid on. Part of the reason I got drawn into being an actor is because I was unsure of myself. The unsurety and insecurity is where you store your best work and that is why you can play other people. If you thought you were the greatest, then how would you play others?