Dia Mirza

Dia Mirza Rekhi (born Dia Handrich; 9 December 1981) is an Indian actress who works in Hindi films.

She won the title of Miss Asia Pacific International in 2000 after being crowned Femina Miss India Asia Pacific 2000.

She was the second runner-up at the Miss India pageant in 2000 and then went on to win the Miss Asia Pacific title in 2000.

She made her debut in Gautham Menon directed Rehnaa Hai Terre Dil Mein, a remake of Menon's Tamil film Minnale.

She then appeared in films such as Alag, Dum, Deewaanapan, Tumko Na Bhool Paayenge, Tumsa Nahin Dekha: A Love Story, Parineeta, Dus, Lage Raho Munna Bhai and Salaam Mumbai.

Mirza was the second runner-up at Femina Miss India 2000 and was subsequently sent to Miss Asia Pacific 2000, where she won.

She also won Miss Beautiful Smile, Miss Avon and Miss Close-Up Smile in Miss India.

When she won the Miss Asia Pacific title on 3 December 2000 in Manila, the Philippines, she became the first Indian since Tara Anne Fonseca to win this title in 27 years.

She completed the hat-trick of India winning international pageants in the year 2000; Lara Dutta won the Miss Universe title and Priyanka Chopra won the Miss World title in the same year.

Mirza has been involved with the Cancer Patients Aid Association and Spastics Society of India, and has worked extensively with the government of Andhra Pradesh to spread HIV awareness, prevention of female foeticide, PETA, CRY and most recently the NDTV Greenathon – an effort to find tangible solutions against pollution and the book, "Deke Dheko" by Radio Mirchi (a campaign initiated to collect books for underprivileged children).

She is on the board of the Coca-Cola Foundation which works towards development in rural India.

She is associated with campaigns such as Sanctuary Asia's Leave Me Alone and Female Foeticide.

She made her acting debut with the film Rehnaa Hai Terre Dil Mein (2001).

He died in 2004.

After initially attending Vidyaranya High School, a co-ed school, Mirza was enrolled into Nasr School, a girl's day school in Khairtabad.

She then attended Stanley Junior College before graduating with a Bachelor of Arts from Ambedkar Open University, Hyderabad.

Mirza worked while in college as a marketing executive for a media firm, Neeraj's Multi-media Studio.

At the same time, she modelled for print and TV commercials for brands such as Lipton, Wall's ice cream, Emami and many more.

She subsequently featured in films including Dus (2005), Lage Raho Munna Bhai (2006) Honeymoon Travels Pvt. Ltd. (2007) and Sanju (2018).

She co-owned a production house, Born Free Entertainment, with her ex-husband Sahil Sangha.

In 2010 she adopted two cheetah cubs at the Prince of Wales zoological park in Lucknow.

Mirza, along with Aamir Khan, publicly expressed support for the Narmada Bachao Andolan, a group protesting the building of a dam.

Their first film, Love Breakups Zindagi, was released on 7 October 2011.

In 2011, she started Born Free Entertainment, a production house with her ex-husband Sahil Sangha.

She has also produced Love Breakups Zindagi, Bobby Jasoos and a sitcom web series titled Mind the Malhotras, streaming on Amazon Prime Video.

The series stars Cyrus Sahukar and Mini Mathur in the lead.

In 2018, she appeared as Sanjay Dutt's wife Manyata Dutt in the biopic Sanju, which ranks among the highest grossing Indian films.

After their divorce, she launched her own production house, One India Stories in 2019.

She also starred in the web series Kaafir in 2019.

Mirza was born in Hyderabad, India.

Her father, Frank Handrich, is a German graphics and industrial fair designer, architect, artist and interior designer based in Munich.

At the same time, her mother, Deepa, is a Bengali interior designer and landscaper who also volunteers to help alcoholics and drug addicts.

When she was four-and-a-half years old, her parents got divorced.

After her mother married Ahmed Mirza, a Muslim man from Hyderabad, she adopted her step-father's surname.

She appeared in the ZEE5 web series Kaafir in 2019.

Set in Kashmir, she starred opposite Mohit Raina in the series.

In December 2019 she announced she was forming a new production house "One India Stories" to create original content.

Mirza lent her voice to a snow leopard called Layla for an environmental podcast of Run Wild, which is a collaboration between Runtastic, the UN Environmental Programme and the Internet of Elephants.

She has written articles for Hindustan Times and other publications.

In 2020, she appeared in Thappad, which went on to win the Filmfare Award for Best Film.