An Inspired Chat with Imran Hasnee of South Band

We recently had the chance to connect with Imran Hasnee and have shared our conversation below.

Imran , really appreciate you sharing your stories and insights with us. The world would have so much more understanding and empathy if we all were a bit more open about our stories and how they have helped shaped our journey and worldview. Let’s jump in with a fun one: What battle are you avoiding?
You know, it’s an interesting question. In an industry built on perception and relationships, one might think the biggest battles are for the next role, the next project, or the next headline. But for me, the most significant battles are the internal ones—the ones you choose not to fight because they compromise your core. The battle I consciously avoid, every single day, is the battle against my own authenticity.

I have made a conscious choice to avoid the hollow battleground of calculated flattery and transactional relationships. I will not engage in the pretense of false friendship or feigned admiration simply as a currency to extract work or opportunity. To me, that is a profound dishonesty—not just to the other person, but to myself and to the craft I have dedicated my life to. This industry, both in India and Hollywood, is a tapestry of genuine human connection, and weaving threads of manipulation into it weakens the entire fabric. I believe my work—as an actor, a director, an author—must speak for itself and be the foundation of my career, not a network of hollow compliments and insincere back-slapping. That is a draining, soul-eroding battle, and I refuse to enlist in it.

Instead, I choose to fight a different, more meaningful battle: the battle for integrity in my work and my interactions. I strive to build relationships based on mutual respect, shared creative passion, and a genuine appreciation for the art. This path may not always be the easiest or the fastest; there might be short-term opportunities that slip by. But the long-term reward is a career built on a foundation of trust and truth. It allows me to look at myself in the mirror and know that every handshake is real, every collaboration is earnest, and every success is earned, not extracted. That is the only victory that truly matters to me

Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
Thank you for having me. It’s a pleasure to be here. I suppose the simplest way to introduce myself is as a storyteller, though the mediums I use are wonderfully varied.

My foundation is in acting, a craft I’ve dedicated my life to understanding, both in front of the camera in Indian and Hollywood films and on the stage. For me, acting is the art of authentic human exploration, a process of channeling truth into a character to tell a story that resonates.

This deep dive into the human psyche naturally expanded into writing. I’m the author of two books: ‘Out of My Body’, which is a very personal exploration of consciousness and the out-of-body experience, this is a paranormal thriller, intertwining with it, a passionate love story. It’s a journey of a ‘dead-man’ struggling against all odds of both the worlds to come
back to life.
The other book is ‘The Djinn’s Curse’, a supernatural thriller that allowed me to weave my other interests into a gripping narrative. The Djinn’s Curse (Jinnaatni) is a paranormal love story that revolves around a female djinn (or Jinn) and her love for a human being.

That passion for directing a complete narrative from the ground up led me to helm the film ‘High Tide’, a project very close to my heart. This movie ‘High Tide’ is a suspense thriller, the struggle of a man who is stuck in a dark situation. Where his life becomes unpredictable. He is unable to understand, who the tormenter is. A Psychopath, a Devil, or a Conspiracy.

And this brings me to another, perhaps more unique, dimension of my work. As a Paranormal Expert, From a very young age, I’ve been aware of a sensitivity to the subtle, unseen layers of our existence. I’ve spent decades cultivating this, not through superstition, but with a curious, almost scientific approach to understanding the paranormal. I view it as the study of the physics we have yet to fully map, and it’s a perspective that deeply informs my creative work, from writing supernatural fiction to exploring the ultimate questions of human existence in my other projects. Helping people, Ultimately, whether I’m acting, writing, directing, or investigating, it all comes back to a relentless curiosity about the stories that lie just beyond the obvious.

Great, so let’s dive into your journey a bit more. Who were you before the world told you who you had to be?
That is a beautifully profound question. It strikes at the very heart of the journey we all undertake. Before the world imposed its definitions of success, its categories, and its expectations, I was, quite simply, a pure sensor and a storyteller.

I was the boy feeling the electric tingle of a presence in an empty room, not with fear, but with a captivating curiosity. I was the one who saw entire epics in the shadows dancing on the wall and heard whispered narratives in the rustling of leaves. There was no separation between the imaginative and the real; it was a single, flowing tapestry of experience. I was a vessel for raw, unfiltered perception—absorbing energies, emotions, and potential stories without the need to label them as “acting,” “writing,” or the “paranormal.” They were all one and the same: a fundamental way of engaging with a universe that felt vibrantly, mysteriously alive.

The world, of course, steps in. It tells you to compartmentalize. It says, “This is your career, this is your hobby, and this is just your imagination.” My entire life’s work—from the characters I embody on screen, to the worlds I build in my books, to the lens through I direct a film, and even the scientific curiosity I apply to the paranormal—has been an effort to return to that boy. It’s the conscious, adult attempt to reintegrate those fractured pieces and become that pure channel of perception once more. To remember that the actor, the author, the director, and the investigator are all just different expressions of that same essential self: a perpetual explorer, forever captivated by the unseen stories that weave through our visible world.

What did suffering teach you that success never could?
Suffering taught me the profound architecture of the human spirit—a blueprint success could never reveal. Success showers you with light, but it’s a light that can often blind you to everything outside its own glow. It teaches you the rhythm of victory, but it’s a rhythm that can make you deaf to the subtler, more complex melodies of life. Suffering, on the other hand, forced me into the quiet, dark corners of my own being. It was there, in that stillness and ache, that I learned to truly see and feel. Success showed me my strengths, but suffering introduced me to my reservoirs—the deep, untapped wells of resilience, patience, and empathy I never knew I possessed. It stripped away the non-essential, the ego, the noise, and left me with the raw, unadorned truth of who I am.

And this is where my work finds its anchor. As an actor, success might teach you how to deliver a line for applause, but suffering teaches you how to find the truth in a silence. It connects you to the universal language of pain, longing, and loss, allowing you to channel a character’s humanity with a authenticity that is bone-deep. As a writer and a student of the paranormal, success might grant you a platform, but suffering grants you perception. It fine-tunes your sensitivity, allowing you to perceive the subtle energies, the unresolved echoes, and the quiet tragedies that linger in spaces and people. Success builds the stage, but suffering provides the script—the real, gritty, beautiful, and heartbreaking stories that are worth telling. It taught me that the most profound growth, like the most compelling characters, is often forged not in the spotlight, but in the shadows

So a lot of these questions go deep, but if you are open to it, we’ve got a few more questions that we’d love to get your take on. Is the public version of you the real you?
That’s a fascinating question, and the answer is both yes and no, but ultimately, I believe it is. The “public version” isn’t a costume I put on; it’s more of a curated gallery of the authentic self.

You see, the “real me” is the entire, sprawling, and sometimes chaotic library of my thoughts, experiences, vulnerabilities, and private moments. It’s the man who wakes up with doubts, who has quiet triumphs unseen, and who navigates the same complex web of relationships and emotions as anyone else. The public version is simply the selection of volumes from that library that I choose to share. It is every bit real—the passion I have for my craft, the beliefs I hold about integrity, the fascination with the unseen—these are all genuine. But it is, by necessity, a focused exhibition. It emphasizes the author, the actor, the director, the seeker.

So, is the public me the whole me? No. But is it a true representation? Absolutely. I made a conscious choice, which we spoke about earlier, to avoid the battle of inauthenticity. Therefore, the persona I present is built from the same core material as my private self. It’s not a fabrication, but an amplification of the key themes that define my journey: a pursuit of truth through storytelling, a curiosity about consciousness, and a belief in the power of genuine human connection. The light is focused, but the source is real.

Thank you so much for all of your openness so far. Maybe we can close with a future oriented question. What is the story you hope people tell about you when you’re gone?
That question touches the very core of why I do what I do. Beyond the film credits, the book covers, or any public accolade, the story I hope endures is a simple one: that I was a bridge.

I hope they say I was a bridge between the seen and the unseen, using the tools of cinema and literature to make the mystical tangible and the human spirit understandable. That my work, whether on screen or on the page, encouraged people to look twice at a shadow, to listen more closely to a silence, and to question the rigid boundaries of our reality. I hope my story is told not as a list of achievements, but as a testament to a life lived with unflinching curiosity and a commitment to authentic expression, never trading integrity for a shortcut.

And this leads to my most personal hope, and indeed, my greatest concern. Over the decades, this path has led thousands of individuals to my doorstep, not for an autograph, but for guidance. People grappling with paranormal disturbances or profound spiritual crises—the touched, the haunted, the lost. We have navigated those terrifying, delicate waters together. The story I hope they tell is that I helped them find their footing, that I offered them a light in their darkest moments. And if I am to be truly honest, the weight of that responsibility is something I carry deeply. There is a quiet worry that whispers, ‘What will they do when you are gone? Who will hold that space for them?’

So, ultimately, the story I hope for is not just one of past help, but of a lasting resonance—that the understanding and peace we cultivated together was so genuine that it continues to guide and protect them long after my final curtain call. That the light we lit, they can now carry themselves.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://imranhasnee.com
• Instagram: https://instagram.com/imranhasnee
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/imran-hasnee
• Twitter: https://x.com/imranhasnee
• Facebook: https:facebook.com/imranhasnee
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/imranhasneemovies

Image Credits
Not appicable