Ritesh Batra graduated from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts film program. In 2009, Batra was selected for the Sundance Writers and Directors labs for his feature script The Story of Ram which earned him a Sundance Time Warner Storytelling Fellow and an Annenburg Fellow. His various short films were acclaimed on the festival circuit such as 2010’s Gareeb Nawaz ki Taxi which won the Jury Prize for Best Narrative Short at the 2011 Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles (IFFLA). In 2011 Batra wrote and directed a series of narrative short films chronicling the social revolution sparked by the Arab Spring protests. The films included his award-winning Café Regular, Cairo which was recently acquired by European broadcaster ARTE. Batra’s screenplay for his feature directorial debut The Lunchbox (screening in the Cannes Critics Week) won an Honorable Jury Mention at the 2012 Cinemart at the Rotterdam International Film Festival. The project was also part of the Berlinale Talent Project Market and was mentored at the Torino festival screenwriter’s lab and at India’s NFDC Film Bazaar in Goa. Batra tells THR why it was important for The Lunchbox to shape up as an international coproduction.