Nawazuddin Siddiqui brings a searing honesty to his portrayals on screen. No prizes for guessing that he brings the same no-filter approach when discussing his personal life as well. Excerpts from his biography, An Ordinary Life (Penguin-Viking) have the actor baring his past relationships with frank openness…

Sunita, his first love

He speaks of the girl who he had his first romantic relationship with during the time he was performing in a play in Mumbai. He calls their union “very sweet, like rain is after a very long spell of drought”. Apparently, she had fallen madly in love with him and would hang out daily at his flat at Mira Road, scribbling their names in a small font all over the wall. Things changed when she went to her hometown to meet her folks. Back in the city, she started avoiding his calls and finally told him that it was best they focus on their respective careers. This casual cut shook him badly and plunged him into depression.
At one point, he was close to suicide – jumping in front of a train seemed like the easy way out of a life minus love, work and money. But the feeling passed, and with it came the determination to never allow himself to be vulnerable in a relationship ever again. Ironically, the same Sunita today tells people she was once in a serious relationship with Nawazuddin Siddiqui...

Encounter in New York

At a café in New York City's Soho area, he was recognised by the stunning waitress who had seen his Lunchbox. They got talking and all he will let on is that what happens in New York stays in New York!

Suzanne & Niharika: Double Trouble!

Nawaz had been living in with Suzanne, a lovely, Jewish girl from New Jersey. She would accompany him to the sets of Miss Lovely. Once when she had to return to the US for her visa, things started changing with his co-star, Niharika Singh. The generally cold actress became friendly and talkative. An invitation for dinner for a home-cooked meal at his place, was followed by her reciprocating the gesture. And what an invitation it turned out to be – her home filled with a hundred flickering candles, and his leading lady in soft faux fur… He scooped her up in his arms and headed straight for the bedroom. And just like that, out of the blue, he says, he began a relationship with Niharika Singh, a relationship which he did not know then would last for almost one and a half years...

However, during the time he still maintained contact with Suzanne, till Niharika succeeded in putting an end to all correspondence between them. However, her nagging got to him. She also expected “some of the sweet conversations that lovers have”, to take place between them. However, by his own admission, Nawaz was “quite a selfish b*****d. I had a plain aim: go to her house, make out and leave. I could not talk lovey-dovey too much. It finally struck her that I was a rascal who cared only for himself.” She ended it, paving the entry for another girl who would come into this life two months later, and never leave…