Shashank Khaitan
Born/Date of Birthday: 28 February 1982
Place of Birth: Kolkata, West Bengal, India
Nationality: Indian
Occupation: Film maker, Director, Screenwriter
Spouse: Nalini Datta Khaitan (m. 2010)
Parents: Dwarka Khaitan
Siblings: Jahnavi Khaitan, Parul Khaitan Poddar

Shashank Khaitan is an Indian film writer, director producer, who is known for his work in Hindi cinema. He made his directorial debut with films Humpty Sharma Ki Dulhania and went on to direct it's spiritual sequel Badrinath Ki Dulhania (2017). Both his films received positive critical response and emerged as grossing Indian productions. His work on the latter garnered him a nomination for the Filmfare Award for Best Director.

He also directed Dhadak (2018) the adaptation of the Marathi film Sairat. Later, in 2019, he turned into a producer at Dharma Productions, his first production being Good Newwz.

Early life
Khaitan was born in Kolkata and raised in Nashik, Maharashtra, in a Marwari business family.

Khaitan was initially more interested in sports, playing in cricket and tennis tournaments. At the age of 17, he decided to pursue a career in entertainment. He started off as a dance instructor and held events across the country. He soon moved to Mumbai. Khaitan joined Whistling Woods International Institute, a film institute started and supported by veteran filmmaker Subhash Ghai, to break into the film industry. He credits the institute with giving him the technical background. While at Whistling Woods, Khaitan worked on his first attempted film, Sherwani Kahaan Hai, with some of his fellow students, but it was not successfully completed.

In 2008, Khaitan starred as Manohar in Roorkee By-Pass, a 22-minute drama directed by Arundhati Sen Verma,

Career
Khaitan made his directional debut with the romantic comedy Humpty Sharma Ki Dulhania. His initial plan with Humpty Sharma Ki Dulhania was to make it a story of two con artists, similar to Bunty Aur Babli but the script eventually moored into a story of flirtatious Punjabi boy who engages in a romantic affair with an engaged Punjabi woman. After finishing the first draft of his script, then with the title Humpty Sharma Di Love Story, Khaitan sent it to Dharma Productions which approved producing it with a first time writer-director at the helm. Khaitan cited Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge (DDLJ) and Casablanca as inspiration for his script, and the film itself pays homage to DDLJ as well as Kuch Kuch Hota Hai. The film was released on 11 July 2014 to positive critical reception and emerged as one of top-grossing Indian productions of the year, earning ₹1.11 billion (US$15 million) worldwide.

Khaitan's next director venture was the romantic comedy Badrinath Ki Dulhania (2017)—which reunited hm with Bhatt and Dhawan.

Khaitan then directed the remake of the Marathi film Sairat (2016) titled Dhadak, co-starring newcomer Janhvi Kapoor and Ishaan Khatter. It tells the story of two young lovers in rural Rajasthan who face political opposition to their relationship due to caste discrimination. Uday Bhatia of Mint criticized Dhadak for lacking the depth of the original film. With worldwide earnings of over ₹1.1 billion (US$15 million), Dhadak emerged as a commercial success.

Khaitan turned into a producer at Dharma Productions in December 2019 with Good Newwz, starring Akshay Kumar, Kareena Kapoor Khan, Diljit Dosanjh and Kiara Advani, which was critically and commercially successful and emerged as the fifth highest-grossing Bollywood film of 2019.

He is set to direct Vicky Kaushal alongside Kiara Advani and Bhumi Pednekar in the comedy Govinda Naam Mera.