"After having choreographed more than a dozen songs, people still remember me as the Kambakht ishq choreographer.

It was the first song I directed, and was sung by Sandeep Chautha and shot at Vasai fort. The lyrics are very good and the song went well with Fardeen Khan and Urmila Matondkar.

Normally, there is a lot of interference from the director, producer and many others. But (producer) Ram Gopal Varma gave me a free hand. I did everything from the editing to the costumes. We rehearsed for a fortnight and I worked on the entire story board.

The toughest part was the rope sequence. The dancers bruised their hands and the girl doing Urmila’s part also bruised her face. They needed to move quickly or the rope would scrape them. It needed a lot of co-ordination.

There is a sequence in which Urmila stands on the shoulder of one of the guys without support, and the guys move in a circular motion. It was risky. This almost became a music video. Fardeen and Urmila had worked with me in stage shows earlier and were comfortable with me. In fact, they were quite happy to have me on board.