I am still attracted to stories about people who are considered to be on the outside of society. I still seek inspiration from those stories.

Never treat anything you do as a stepping stone. Do it fully, and follow it completely.

If we don't tell our own stories, no one else will.

Making films is about having absolute and foolish confidence; the challenge for all of us is to have the heart of a poet and the skin of an elephant.

It is because my roots are so strong that I can fly.

What is really important to me is a sense of humour and a mischief about life. Life is just too boring otherwise.

We all know the power of film; we all know there's almost nothing more powerful than to see people on film that look and talk like you, like we do.

We have to realize only in communication, in real knowledge, in real reaching out, can there be an understanding that there's humanity everywhere, and that's what I'm trying to do.

Christmas lights may be the loneliest thing for me, especially if you mix them up with reindeers and sleighs. I feel alone. I feel isolated. I feel I do not belong.

I grew up in a small town in India, but through books I knew the world.

'Salaam Bombay' didn't put a halo on the poor. Instead, it said that they will teach us how to live.

To the timid and hesitating everything is impossible because it seems so.

True friends stab you in the front.

In all honesty, titles are an embarrassment to me.

Spring makes everything look filthy.

History illumes reality, vitalizes memory, provides guidance in daily life

Nothing can be colder than his head, when the lightnings of his imagination are playing in the sky.

Art does not begin with imitation, but with discipline.

I don't think we should take the emotional reactions of a few people as more representative than those of the millions of people who took to the street in a non-violent way against dictators.

I like a person who knows his own mind and sticks to it; who sees at once what, in given circumstances, is to be done, and does it.

One hearty laugh together will bring enemies into a closer communion of heart than hours spent on both sides in inward wrestling with the mental demon of uncharitable feeling.