Srihari Anand is making his directorial debut with a murder mystery titled Karmanye Vadhikaraste. The film stars Divya Gowda, Tsering Dolma, and newcomer Prateek. “Tsering has her roots in Nepal. The model-turned-actor is currently settled in Mumbai. In our film, she is based in China, and is on a week-long visit to India,” says Srihari, who recently launched the film’s teaser.

According to the director, the story of Karmanye Vadhikaraste goes back to an incident in the 1850s, which gets a callback in 2019. “A medicine forms the key aspect of our film,” the debutant reveals.

Srihari, who has no previous experience as a director, has worked as an assistant director in two films, which are yet to be released. “My lessons were learnt mostly by watching films. Moreover, my technical team — music director Rithwik Muralidhar, DOP Uday Leela (who has worked in Sankashta Kara Ganapathi), lyricist Santhosh Naik, and editor Vijeth Chandra — have been a big support,” says Srihari.

The team of Karmanye Vadhikaraste, which is set to begin post-production work, is looking at a November release.