MUMBAI:
17-year-old Neeha Gupta’s Swapped was launched at Title Waves Bandra yesterday. Published by Leadstart, the book is a gripping tale of teenage dilemmas and friendship.
The book was launched via a panel discussion between award-winning filmmaker Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra and author Neeha Gupta and moderated by film critic and senior journalist Aakanksha Naval-Shetye.
The discussion veered towards friendship, teenage ambition and the quest for personal growth.
“Friends are those who get you into trouble,” joked Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra, who added gravitas to the book launch. He also added, “ youngsters must be allowed to discover what they’re meant to become, over time.”
Aakanksha Naval-Shetye deftly guided the discussion towards Rakesyh Mehra’s own reading habits- to which he said, “I read 15 pages here and there. I like to explore parts of various books, unlike my wife and daughter who are voracious readers.” Neeha Gupta shared, “ I would like to explore Swapped as a web series.”
The event also saw the launch of a song ‘It’s a big world out there’, which is part of the book “Swapped” sung by Neeha Gupta and Sidharth Bhambure, also a student of standard 12th, Neeha’s classmate and a budding musician who has already uploaded albums on Spotify, itunes etc;
Actor Maninee De Mishra and designer Archana Kochhar were present for the book launch.