Manisha Koirala to wed Nepali businessman?

Bollywood actress and the daughter of one of the most powerful political houses in Nepal, Manisha Koirala, seems finally set to tie the knot – and in Nepal.

The 40-year-old actress, the country’s most eligible single woman, will finally say “I do” to Nepali businessman Samrat Dahal with the wedding set for June 19.

“Mutual acquaintances told me about a week ago that Manisha Koirala was getting married in Nepal,” said Nepali film director Dipendra Khanal, whose upcoming release “Dharma” will mark the return of the actress to the Nepali film industry nearly two decades after she left Nepal to storm Bollywood.

Manisha, presently shooting in Kerala for a Telugu film, will return to Kathmandu Friday, Khanal told IANS.

She was in Nepal last month to attend the last rites of her grand-uncle Girija Prasad Koirala. At a press conference afterwards, she said the patriarch of Nepal’s politics and five-time prime minister had lamented to her that nobody loved him; people flocked to him only to get something out of him.

She was asked about her wedding plans but she parried the questions without divulging her new romance.

The would-be bridegroom was reportedly educated in the US and is a businessman. While not much is known about him, his father Surendra Dahal made his fortune in the leather industry.

The wedding will be a three-day extravaganza that is expected to see Mumbai’s stars descend on Kathmandu.

Manisha, grand-daughter of Nepal’s first elected prime minister Girija Prasad Koirala, had a minor fling with politics in 2005 when she supported King Gyanendra’s bid to seize power with an army-backed coup.

However, the move backfired and led to the abolition of monarchy in Nepal, once the world’s only Hindu kingdom.

It is being speculated that Manisha could enter politics finally. Her aunt Sujata Koirala is the deputy prime minister of Nepal while two of her uncles are MPs.

Her father Prakash Koirala was a minister in King Gyanendra’s cabinet but was expelled by his Nepali Congress party that led the pro-democracy movement against the king.

Manisha acted in just one film in Nepal, “Pheri Bhetaula” (We will meet again), that was, however, never released. She got her big break from modelling in Nepal when she was cast by Bollywood director Subhash Ghai in “Saudagar” and then went on to act in such acclaimed films as Mani Ratnam’s “Dil Se” and “Mumbai”, Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s “Khamoshi” and Vidhu Vinod Chopra’s “1942: A Love Story”.