The wedding season is upon us and we hear wedding bells ringing everywhere in the tinsel town. But breaking away from a traditional engagement ceremony Manish Naggdev has decided to exchange rings with his partner, Malika Juneja (HR manager), at a sundowner party in Goa. The two had a roka ceremony in July 2020 and are all set to get engaged on June 8.
As per the news doing the rounds, the wedding will take place in September but the date has not yet been finalized. In an interview with Etimes, Manish, who has been part of shows like Udann, Begusarai and Banoo Main Teri Dulhann, says, “Malika and I had been planning the wedding for the past year. However, it kept getting postponed because of the COVID-19 scare. Since we plan to have an intimate wedding affair, we decided to have an engagement party. I wanted it to be a casual affair and not formal at all. Na koi load na koi tension, na hamein aur na hi guests ko. Now, there can’t be a better place than Goa for it. The engagement will be during the sunset by the pool. We tried to organise it in Mumbai, but it was turning out to be very expensive. At this stage, we didn’t want to spend a lot of money. The idea was to keep it small and have a great party.”
Were his parents fine with the idea of a sundowner party given that they, too, must have had made some plans for their son’s big day? “My mother told me, ‘ Tu 38 saal mein shaadi kar raha hai. Kaise bhi kar raha hai bas jaldi kar le’,” he laughs.
Giving us a sneak peek into his wedding plan, Manish tells us, “It won’t be a grand celebration. Malika and I plan to have a simple wedding or it could be a court marriage, too. We plan to invite only 15-20 people for it.”
The couple is tying the knot two years after their roka ceremony. The wait also led people to wonder whether everything was fine in their paradise. Manish says, “ Mujhse toh bohot kam expect karte hain yeh soch kar ki kahiin phir se kuchh ho gaya hoga (laughs!). I am used to such assumptions. Malika and I share a great bond and are very strong as a couple. The delay happened because we were working on our finances for our big day. We want to be wise with our money and savings. Also, I live in a joint family and had to wait for a time when I could have invited everyone.”
The long wait was challenging too, admits Manish, adding, “Malika lives in Pune and I am based out of Mumbai. It is a long-distance relationship. We would also have arguments and fights over the delay. In fact, we reached a point where we decided to get married in a simple affair with just our families in attendance. But we waited because along with our families, we also wanted our relatives and friends to bless us on our big day.”
Earlier, he would have liked to post regular updates about his personal life, but Manish is a changed man now. He likes to keep his relationship away from the media glare. “I prefer it that way. I know what’s happening in my life and I don’t really care about what people think. The kind of experiences I have had in the past have made me a bit insecure. I can’t predict the future and I don’t know what will happen next. I didn’t want to repeat mistakes and decided to talk about my roka, engagement and marriage only once everything was final,” he says.