Raghav Pillutla

Raghav Pillutla
File:Raghav Pillutla.jpgRaghav Pillutla.jpg Raghav Pillutla.jpg
Born	2003-03-13
🏫 Education	Bachelor’s Degree in Digital Filmmaking – Direction and Editing from Srishti Manipal Institute of Art, Design and Technology (2024)
💼 Occupation	Director | Screenwriter | Producer | Actor | Editor
Height	178 cm (5 ft 10 in)
Family	Rajanikanth Pillutla (Father)

---

Raghavagopal Pillutla (born 13 March 2003) is an Indian film director, writer, actor, editor and producer who works in Hindi cinema. His films often explore the human condition through varied, light hearted, nuanced, middle-of-the-road storytelling. He is also noted for his charismatic appeal, charming, witty on screen presence and effortless cool.

Pillutla's highly critically and publically acclaimed feature films include the independently produced coming-of-age drama Mann Behka (2025), and the documentary feature India: As I Didn't Know Her (2026). His directorial debut, Mann Behka, premiered at the 10th Rajasthan International Film Festival, where he received the Best Debut Director award for Hindi Feature Film.

Early life and education

Raghavagopal Pillutla was born on 13 March 2003, into a Vaidiki Brahmin family in Hyderabad. He has a younger brother. His father is a corporate executive, while his mother is a counselling psychotherapist. He is fluent in Hindi, Telugu and English.

Throughout his childhood, Pillutla moved frequently between Delhi, Hyderabad and Bangalore, growing up in a middle-class household. He played cricket at a semi-pro level into his late teens. Despite his cricketing career being highly erratic, he credits the sport as a major learning experience that deeply shaped his personality.

According to accounts from his school years, Pillutla was regarded by classmates and friends as a good student who was also mischievous and humorous during his childhood. He reportedly entered his first romantic relationship at the age of 13. He was also part of the under-14 state camp as a later addition.

His cricketing career became particularly difficult during his teenage years. At the age of 14, he was dropped from his school team following a poor run of performances. Pillutla has described this period as a low point in his adolescence, during which he experienced social isolation and had to rebuild his social relationships. Accounts of the period also describe him as becoming involved in confrontations with peers and finding himself in difficult social situations.

Pillutla subsequently returned to competitive cricket till he tore three ligaments during a match, and became more settled socially. During his final year of high school, he entered a chaotic second relationship, which he has credited with contributing to his emotional maturity. Peers and colleagues mention a significant increase in social interactions whilst simultaneously making Mann Behka, and numerous romantic experiences setting off in his college years. Following graduation, Pillutla has reportedly been linked romantically to several women.

Amidst his cricketing struggles, Pillutla developed a strong interest in cinema, which soon evolved into a deep passion for filmmaking. He holds a bachelor’s degree in Digital Filmmaking – Direction and Editing from Srishti-Manipal Institute of Art, Design and Technology.

Though always science inclined, Pillutla opted for commerce and mathematics due to hectic cricket schedules. Post graduation and after Mann Behka's release, Pillutla, in 2026, re-enrolled through National Institute of Open Schooling, completing his senior secondary in physics, chemistry and biology.

Personal Life

Before Mann Behka's release, curiosity sparked in Pillutla's mind regarding familial origins. No one would believe he's south Indian. As a result, he dug deep - spoke to priests, read research papers, interacted with family elders. Due to strict continuous endogamy followed on both parents' side, research showed that his community traces their roots to being the priests of Varanasi, Ayodhya and Ujjain, coming down south due to Mughal invasion as recently as 500 years ago.

Post the release of Mann Behka, Raghav Pillutla backpacked across India by train, documenting his experiences in India: As I Didn't Know Her. After undertaking a demanding solo edit over five to six months, often working fifteen-hour days in Delhi and Hyderabad, Pillutla travelled alone through Southeast Asia. While staying at his uncle's residence in Malaysia, he declined an advertising opportunity for his uncle's company, citing creative burnout.

Pillutla subsequently travelled through Vietnam, moving between its major cities and coastal regions, including Ha Long Bay and Cat Ba Island. He stayed in inexpensive hostels, travelled by motorbike and ferry, and fell into the informal social world of international backpackers. Days were spent exploring unfamiliar neighbourhoods, museums and coastlines; evenings often extended into romantic frolicking, nightclub draped nights. Among the more memorable episodes were excursions into the waters around Ha Long Bay, where he swam in deep water and jumped from yachts. The journey was marked less by a fixed itinerary than by chance encounters, improvised plans and the company of people met along the way.

Embarking across Western Europe on a limited budget for forty days, Pillutla stayed in hostels, ate local cuisine and frequently used public transport - sometimes boarding without tickets, walking 25 kilometers a day. He adapted readily to local routines and the social life of the places he visited, moving between cities with few fixed plans.

Along the way, he experienced warm hospitality, unexpected encounters with local residents and informal exchanges with officials, including occasions when bureaucrats questioned him about his travels. The trips also involved confrontations and two reported near-fatal incidents when biking across the Amalfi Coast and swimming against the current, pyrexic and on antibiotics in the Eisbach river. Pillutla's passport was stolen midway through the European journey, requiring him to smoothly resolve the resulting administrative issues only once his entire trip was complete. Despite these setbacks, he continued travelling, forming strong friendships and experiencing a succession of romantic encounters. Friends recalled that he partied for sixty consecutive nights during the Vietnam and European trips.

Pillutla has credited his parents with encouraging him to undertake the trips and travel independently, less as a tourist and more a local.

Career

Pillutla began working as a freelance filmmaker at 17 years old, building a portfolio of several short films and videos under the banner Raghav Pillutla Films, contributing in various capacities.

While attending film school, in a bid to further hone his craft, Pillutla took on freelance client projects, briefly worked in the post-production department on a few Hindi films from major studios, and wrote film reviews, retrospectives, and papers on cinema for Upperstall.com. Simultaneously, he applied his learnings and earned funds to independently write, direct and produce his debut feature film, Mann Behka, a slow burn coming-of-age romantic drama, made on a shoestring budget over five years from conception to release. The film garnered high critical acclaim and public affection, premiering at the 10th Rajasthan International Film Festival - RIFF 2024, where it received the Best Debut Director for Hindi Feature Film award.

He also directed a commissioned statecraft AV called The Village Clinic on Padma Shri Dr. B Ramana Rao, featuring Amitabh Bachchan screened for Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Following Mann Behka, Pillutla directed, edited, produced and starred in his second feature, and his debut non fiction, India: As I Didn't Know Her. The documentary follows Pillutla backpacking solo across core India, guided by chance encounters that reveal the country beyond politics, nostalgia and a foreign gaze in a sharp and brisk fever dream-like manner, in a one man crew. The film was shot on an android phone and raw in-camera sound.

The non fiction began on his father's suggestion to take a vacation post Mann Behka's frenzy. Not finding a direct train or flight ticket to visit his grandparents in Delhi, Pillutla decided to make his trip interesting incorporating the perfect mix of culture, people, history and food, exploring parts of India he normally wouldn't. Pillutla reluctantly agreed to record his encounters at the suggestion of family and friends.

Pillutla initiated the edit on the invitation of top OTT platforms which didn't materialize as intended, editing the film across Delhi and Hyderabad. His intent was to direct a non-fiction feature easy to consume and diametrically/ tonally different to Mann Behka.

He has also written a yet-to-be-published fiction novel, tentatively titled Between Places, highlighting a Gen Zs eclectic experiences across adolesence and youth.

Filmography

Feature Films

Year	Title	Director	Writer	Producer	Notes
2025	Mann Behka	Yes	Yes	Yes
2026	India: As I Didn't Know Her	Yes	Yes	Yes	Also cinematographer, sound designer and sound mixer in a one-man crew film.

Acting Roles

Year	Title	Role	Notes
2025	Mann Behka	Daksh Aggarwal	Also Director, Writer and Producer
2026	India: As I Didn't Know Her	As Himself	Also Director, Writer, Editor and Producer

Short Films - Selected Filmography

Year	Title	Director	Writer	Producer	Editor	DoP	Notes
2020	Jack’s Tiresome Day	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Stop motion animation short
2021	A Day in Godrej	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Short documentary
2021	Introduction to Banjara	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Corporate film
2022	Trishna	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Short fiction
2022	The Reticent Hustle	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Short documentary
2023	Bangalore Fort: A Slice of the Past	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Short documentary
2023	Langda Ghoda	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Short fiction
2026	The Village Clinic	Yes	No	No	No	No	Statecraft AV (Director - Post)

Awards

Award	Year	Category	Work	Prize	Result
Rajasthan International Film Festival, RIFF	2024	Feature Film - National	Mann Behka	Best Debut Director for Hindi Feature Film	Won

References

This article "Raghav Pillutla" is from Wikipedia. The list of its authors can be seen in its historical and/or the page Edithistory:Raghav Pillutla. Articles copied from Draft Namespace on Wikipedia could be seen on the Draft Namespace of Wikipedia and not main one.

---