So began his journey into the glamour world of entertainment. Four years after he started out as a secretary, he launched his company Media Entertainment. His first TV production Imtihaan was a great success on Doordarshan. But Kher was not going to remain merely behind the scenes. Like his brother, he went on to become an actor. He was to appear in many serials and soon displayed his versatility both as a dramatic and comic actor. With serials such as Sailaab, Thoda Hai.... Raju Kher established himself as a top Tellywood actor. Today, he might well find a place for himself in the Guinness Book of Records as perhaps the only actor to have appeared in over 200 TV pilots!

Kher is now the talk of Tellywood as he turns director with a soap called Sanskaar which is also being produced by his company. The serial will go on air (Zee), from March 15 at 2 pm. Sanskaar is a family soap (is there any other kind?) which revolves around love, faith and friendship. It deals with the values of life and relationships.

In the process of making this serial, Kher has made the transition from actor to director. ``As an actor, I would think this shot could have been taken from that angle or a particular scene could have been written in a better way. So I thought why not try it myself,'' he explains, clarifying that he chose a family subject not because of the current trend or because of the success of serials like Amaanat and Ashirwad (both on Zee): he had begun work on Sanskaar two years ago because he loved the concept and the story. The serial is being written by Shah Suri and stars Govind Namdeo (who recently said that he'd do television only if it was something interesting, so we guess this one is), Anang Desai, R Madhavan. Khere exudes confidence and is super cool.

While driving down in his new Honda City he reminisces about the time when he had bought his first car a 1963 model Fiat for Rs 33,000 which was in such a bad condition that if he banged one door shut, the opposite one would open. Later, he realised that he was duped as the car was worth only 15,000. ``I had never dreamt of a luxury car, my own house. It's all destiny,'' he feels. ``Acting was never on my agenda, forget producing and directing. I was very happy with my 9 to 5 job''. His first break came out of compulsion: when Mahesh Bhatt was directing Kaash he needed a firang-looking guy and Ravi Rai who was assisting Bhatt then forced Kher to do the role since he couldn't find any other actor.

``I remember how I was shivering and trembling and the cup and saucer in my hand was rattling. I finally did the scene without the saucer,'' he remembers. That was all Raju Kher had to his credit until he created Media Entertainment and launched Imtihaan which was also Ravi Rai's first independent directorial venture. It was also Kher's first good TV role. ``One evening we were having a drink and Ravi kept making fun of my acting. But after 3 pegs, I said I can do a role without thinking,'' he recalls and proceeded to do so. After that he realised that acting was not all that difficult. Subsequently, his role in Imtihaan stretched from 2 episodes to 130.

There followed roles in serials such as Kismet, Tara, Aparajita, Tere Ghar Ke Saamne and many more. Being Anupam Kher's brother says Raju created a lot of problems as people were reluctant to approach him assuming he was too busy and expensive. ``I'd to go to producers asking for work. I'd no ego problems then and even now. Bhai saab (Anupam) never helped me or referred me to anyone,'' he insists.

Raju's only dream as an actor is to play Anupam's brother in a film. In case you didn't know it, he has done films like Sham Ghansham, Bade Dilwala, but the only problem was the films crash-landed at the box office so his film career failed to take-off. Even his company was recently in the doldrums: last year they didn't have a single serial on air. Kher feels it was mainly due to lack of planning and budgeting. ``We trusted certain people and we never kept a check on them and they misused a lot of funds. Suddenly we realised we'd lost a lot of money so we couldn't carry on and we voluntarily took our serials off the air. We're still paying off our old dues,'' he explains.

After all these problems he's now launched another company Radical Entertainment, as an astrologer told them that the alphabet `M' is not auspicious for them. So henceforth they would make programmes under the banner of Radical Entertainment instead of Media Entertainment. As of now Kher is thoroughly happy with his new avtar as a director except that it's too tiring and even in his sleep he is thinking of his takes and shot divisions. ``It is very exhausting, the mind is always preoccupied. But I'm really enjoying it and I believe until you enjoy what you're doing you can't do a good job,'' he states.