/> Spotted at Taj Land's End in Bandra on Tuesday afternoon were Sanjay Gupta and buddy Sanjay Dutt with some of the biggest talents of the Indian entertainment industry: Shyam Benegal, A.R.Rahman, Javed Akhtar, Vaibhavi Merchant, Allan Amin and Ila Arun.

"Oh we were brain storming over lunch and looking at possibilities of working together," laughs Gupta.

Right now, Gupta is all geared to start Dus Kahaniyan, a collection of short stories featuring top-of-the-line talent.

The actors..... Sanjay Dutt, Arjun Rampal, Viveik Oberoi, Nana Patekar, Aftab Shivdasani, Arbaaz Khan, Tusshar Kapoor, Rohit Roy..... More confirmations are on the way.

The actresses....Bipasha Basu, Tanushree Dutta, Esha Deol, Mandira Bedi and Yana Gupta. The female casting continues.

And among the 10 directors are Sanjay Gupta, Hansal Mehta, Sudhir Mishra, Apoorva Lakhia (who wants to make his short story with Abhishek Bachchan who's yet to confirm), Meghna Gulzar and Jasmeet Dodhi (Gupta's first assistant director). Vishal Bhardawaj also wants to direct a short film for Gupta.

The writers include Gulzar, Javed Akhtar, Kamlesh Pandey, Vishal Bhardwaj, Suresh Nair and Sanjay Gupta.

And the list is still far from complete...

Sanjay Gupta is all set to launch Bollywood's first feature-film collection of short stories entitled Dus Kahaniyan.

Says Gupta, "Each film, for example one featuring Nana Patekar called Gubbare, or the one entitled Zanzi featuring Viveik Oberoi and Tanushree Dutta, will be done with elaborate brochure and posters. Every short story will have the best technicians and talent."

The first short story starts filming on 9 May. The ten stories will be released as one feature film called Dus Kahaniya. It will then proceed to the internet. Then finally in January 2007 the stories will be downloaded on cellphones when the 4G technique comes into the country.

Excited beyond measure Gupta says, "I know the concept of ten stories in one package sounds strange...just as the one-day international match would've been ludicrous in the 1960s and 70s. We're serving up a thali as one meal."

What about the failure of Ram Gopal Varma's segmented films Darna Manaa Hai and Darna Zaroori Hai? "That's entirely due to the way he marketed his films. Those stories were all interconnected. The stories of our Dus Kahaniyan aren't linked together. Viewers won't get bored because the stories aren't in any way similar."

How did he manage to convince all the actors to do ten-minute films? Chuckles Gupta. "That's the beauty of this endeavour. Every actor and actress jumped at the idea. They see this as truly the first short-film venture in Bollywood. Ramu's Darna....series was one big feature.

Mani Rathnam's Yuva had three interconnected stories. Naseeruddin Shah's first directorial venture has four stories and Nikhil Advani's Salaam-e-Ishq has a number of love stories that come together. My stories in Dus Kahaniyan are truly autonomous. And no, I wasn't inspired by Crash."

And what about Sanjay Gupta's tie-up with Ekta Kapoor? "We're like chalk and cheese. It's a strategic alliance that got worked out in two meetings. In the first meeting we knew we had a common vision. Neither Ekta nor I are in this for money.

Agar paise banaane hote to main Old Boy (Zinda) ke jegah 'Bad Boy' banaata. We're looking at films we both would be proud of.

The minute Ekta heard the concept for Shootout at Lokhandwala which is a highly unconventional film, she jumped at it. She'll also be part of Dus Kahaniyan and my directorial venture Alibaug.

Basically we've worked out modalities whereby Ekta's Balajee Talefilms will extend their financial and marketing support to our company White Feather. With Sanju (Dutt) coming on officially as the chairperson of our company we're looking at a new level of our existence."

But this alliance with Ekta Kapoor isn't applicable to every film that Sanjay Gupta's company will make. Gupta is negotiating with other big production for alliances.

Gupta is exhilarated. "What a high! I feeel so stupid about the work that I did so far."