Ranbir, Deepika engaged to be married!

It’s official. Bollywood’s "it" couple Ranbir Kapoor and Deepika Padukone are engaged to be married.

Deepika, whose debut movie Om Shanti Om turned her into a household name, chatted exclusively to HT City yesterday via telephone from Bangkok, confirming that she and Ranbir are engaged to be married.

She spoke about their marriage plans, squashed rumours of a rift and declared that, in five years, she hoped to be “Mrs Kapoor and the leading lady of Bollywood”.

Deepika confessed that Ranbir proposed to her at the time of their debut releases in November last year. “And I happily said yes.”

The couple met a few months earlier. She said she accepted because she was happy, deeply in love and the couple had the blessings of their parents.

“Our parents are happy with our relationship.” With their parents blessings it looks like history may just be repeating itself. Ranbir’s parents Rishi Kapoor and Neetu Singh met in 1975 on a film set and were married five years later.

She laughed off rumours that her schedule had put a strain on their love. The two squeezed in quality time a few days ago when Ranbir flew to Bangkok where she was shooting Chandni Chowk to China. “We read about the rumours of our split and had a gala time laughing.”

She said some of the rumours had been hurtful. “At times it can be really upsetting. As we are open about our relationship, people should give some amount of respect to our relationship by not cooking up rumours,” she said.

The latest gossip is that raunchy pictures of her with actor Upen Patel, aired on television recently, had deeply upset Ranbir. Not so, said Deepika, “Ranbir has already seen my portfolio and that was a shoot for designer Wendell Rodricks two years back when I was modelling. I am not ashamed of it.”

The star said the couple had learned not to allow such talk to affect them: “It’s ridiculous and now it has stopped affecting us also. We will decide how to conduct our relationship and nobody has a right to take us for granted and write any rubbish about us.”

Deepika said while it was tough being away from him, Ranbir had been supportive and loving while she completed back to back movies. “Ranbir understands as he is a part of the fraternity. The gelling force of our relationship is that we understand each other really well.”

She said they worked at staying in touch. “We respect each other’s... (commitments) and fly down to meet whenever we find time.”

The actress has just completed three movies. Her next release will be Yash Raj’s Bachna Ae Haseeno starring the two lovebirds.

“We had a great time in Australia working together for Bachna Ae Haseeno. We spent some quality time together.” They met through mutual friends when Ranbir was shooting Saawariya and Deepika was filming Om Shanti Om.

“It was love at first sight. We were introduced by a mutual friend and we liked each other but we needed time for our love to grow before we could make a commitment.”

She said they still had a ways to go before they tie the knot. “We are on the threshold of our careers and have a long way to go."