Hanuman Ansh, a film about a Hindu spiritual figure has quietly become one of the biggest surprise hits at the box office and the woman behind it never even planned to make a movie. Hanuman Ansh has crossed Rs. 123 crore nett in India within just 32 days of release, and its 21-year-old producer, Anupriya Nagar, says the whole journey began with an unlikely spark: an article about Steve Jobs.
Anupriya Nagar was studying Economics in the UK when her path took an unexpected turn. She had been researching how the founders of major tech companies came up with their world-changing ideas and stumbled upon a connection between Apple’s late co-founder and the Indian spiritual guru Neem Karoli Baba. That discovery changed everything for her, instead of moving to Switzerland for an art industry job she had already lined up, she returned to India, eventually crossed paths with filmmaker Dr. Vishal Chaturvedi, who happened to be working on a film about the same spiritual figure, and the rest, as she describes it, unfolded purely by coincidence.
Speaking to a news channel, Anupriya Nagar explained that filmmaking was never part of her plan. She had just finished a three-year Economics degree in the UK and was preparing to relocate to Switzerland for a promising job in the art world, an industry she’d grown up immersed in.
Her curiosity about Neem Karoli Baba took root during her final year of university, while she was digging into how tech founders like the people behind Apple and Meta had arrived at their breakthrough ideas. In the course of that research, she found an article revealing that Neem Karoli Baba had influenced Steve Jobs and that Steve Jobs had reportedly conceived the idea for a colour computer during a visit to Kainchi Dham. What struck her most was the irony of learning about an Indian saint’s influence through a foreign source rather than an Indian one, and that irony pushed her to dig deeper.
The subject stuck with her. At first, she considered turning her research into a book or a comic. But those plans shifted entirely once she returned to India and met Dr. Vishal Chaturvedi who was already developing a film on the same subject, a meeting she describes as completely unplanned and purely coincidental.
Now, at just 21, Anupriya Nagar is the producer of a film that’s picked up serious momentum in its fourth week. In an interview, she was clear that money was never her motivation for making it. She acknowledged it was a risk to make a film centered on the spiritual leader but insisted box office numbers were never the goal — she is simply glad audiences are connecting with it and admitted she doesn’t yet know what to do with the success that’s followed.
Anupriya Nagar’s background gave her an unusual head start in storytelling. She comes from a family of art collectors and grew up surrounded by some of India’s most celebrated artists – names like Jagdish Swaminathan, MF Husain, Gaitonde and Raza were part of her everyday world. She’s also held several art exhibitions of her own and credits that environment for shaping her instinct for storytelling.
Hanuman Ansh’s success has also shifted how her family views her career choice. She recalled her father’s initial skepticism when she told him she wanted to make a film, given that her academic background was in Economics, but the moment she mentioned the subject was Neem Karoli Baba, his hesitation disappeared instantly. Today, she said, her family couldn’t be prouder.
She also opened up about the rocky start of Hanuman Ansh – after its first week, it had already been written off as a flop within the industry and the team’s morale took a hit. But things turned around almost overnight, driven largely by word of mouth and support from viewers and influencers, turning it into the phenomenon it is today.
Have you watched Hanuman Ansh?
