By Meena Iyer

You’d imagine he’d be sitting in his palatial bungalow with butterflies in his stomach because his latest film Luck — produced by Dhilin Mehta for Shree Ashtavinayak Cine Vision Ltd. — is slated for release on July 24, worldwide. But Imran Khan is different.

The buzz is that the Jaane Tu...Ya Jaane Na heart-throb has taken a couple of days off to ring in his girlfriend Avantika Malik’s birthday at a secret destination.

Parties aside, work is worship for the young actor. And, he is as excited about the Soham Shah-directed Luck as he was about his debut vehicle Jaane Tu... The difference is that while in the former he broke hearts, in the latter Imran will set the screen ablaze with some derring-do stunts in this high adrenaline, action adventure shot in Namibia whose gripping storyline is meant to keep audiences at the edge of their seats.

Imran says “going underwater with sharks and jumping onto a burning train” under the expert eye of stunt director Allan Amin got his blood racing. His most treasured possession is his personal safety kit... that has everything from a harness and other equipment worn for tackling the danger mid-air. “You can never be too careful while hanging from a cliff or jumping off a helicopter. I make it a point not to take chances,’’ he says. Though his motto is to be safe rather than sorry, the 26-year-old actor is extremely committed to his craft and he loves challenges. “I enjoy working with directors like Sanjay Gadhvi, Soham Shah and Abbas Tyrewala who push me to give a film all I have got,’’ he says.

But does he believe in luck? Everyone in Bollywood says Genelia D’Souza, his co-star in Jaane Tu... is his lucky charm.
“I enjoyed working with Genelia. However, I don’t give too much emphasis to luck. Success is all about hard work,” says Imran whose co-star this time is the sexy debutante Shruti Haasan. The film also stars Sanjay Dutt, Mithun Chakraborthy, Ravi Kishaan, Chitrashi Rawat and Danny Denzongpa.