Is Ayushmaan Khurana married?

It was six years back that city-based Tahira Kashyap thought of writing her debut book. She was all of 19, dreamy-eyed, was writing script for a play Socha Na Tha and wanted to convert that into a full-fledged book. But work and travel kept her busy "I had the story with me since 2002, but I revisited it after I got married and landed in Mumbai," says Kashyap, 27, who recently released her debut book I Promise (Pustak mahal, Rs 125) in the city.

Story of a pyre-maker named Raghunath, the book talks of his life and living with the dead. "But then somebody's presence changes everything. There is love and there is deciet. The twist in the protagonist's life has the readers thinking that whether it is better to be a living dead, or is it better to live a full short life," says Kashyap, who clarifies that there is no social message in the book.

Kashyap settles at her Sector 3 residence and rewinds seven months, the time when she was busy finding her space and pace in the fast lanes of Mumbai. It was a new territory, and it gave rise to the need to rediscover herself. After shuttling from being a senior consultant with a PR firm to an aerobics instructor and a freelance professor visiting three different colleges in Mumbai, Kashyap felt that something was missing. "It's then that I picked from where I actually left. I got back to my script— Socha Na Tha and converted it into a book," says Kashyap, who immediately began to write the chapters for the 152 page paper-backer. "I worked on the book for seven hours a day, met publishers and finalised the manuscript." says Kashyap, who is married to MTV VJ Ayushmann Khurrana.

Kashyap calls her book a light read with an element of immaturity to it. "This speaks of the innocence that I had when I was 19 and I first thought of the script. Those were the days before I went on to do my Masters in Mass Communication from Panjab University," says Kashyap. She adds that this is even before she fell in love with Khurrana and got married to him. "He's been my motivation and my inspiration. But beyond that we both respect each other's world," she says, but is quick to come back to the author in her. "I have already started my next book. It will comprise short stories and will have influences from the people I've met," she signs off.