The final round of the ‘Sahara Manoranjan Mr & Miss Bollywood’ contest, the largest ever talent hunt in India to unearth 30 actors, began here today. The three-day auditions are being held at the historic Filmistan Studios at Goregaon. The final 74 aspirants, to be selected from the over 40,000 entries initially received from all over the country, assembled in Mumbai on August 2 to begin their gruelling three-day session. The performances will be judged by a panel comprising of well-know Bollywood luminaries like Karan Johar, Ashutosh Gowariker, Mahesh Bhatt, Smita Thackeray, Pankaj Parashar, Priyadarshan, E. Niwas and Ken Ghosh among others. Some of these personalities will also interact with the participants and give them tips on acting.

Thirty actors will be selected from these 74 and they will be groomed for a career in showbiz. Four of these 30 will be given lead roles in films. The winners will be trained in Mumbai and then launched into showbiz. The 26 other winners will be given assignments in television serials. The talent hunt kicked off in late March 2004. Road shows were held in four cities where Celina Jaitly, Neha Dupia, Bipasa Basu and Diya Mirza put in appearances as brand ambassadors. Entries were received from all over India as well as UK, US, Pakistan and the UAE. These were short-listed and preliminary auditions were held across India.