| Aarti Bajaj | |
| Birth Date: | 10 February 1973 |
| Birth Place: | Delhi, India |
| Occupation: | Film editor |
| Children: | Aaliyah Kashyap |
| Yearsactive: | 1995–present |
| Nationality: | Indian |
Aarti Bajaj is an Indian film editor who predominantly works on Bollywood movies. She has won several awards for her work. She has edited critically acclaimed movies similar as Jab We Met, etc. Aarti Bajaj is known for her ability to bring out the emotional depth of the characters and the story through her editing.
Aarti Bajaj began editing with Anurag Kashyap's unreleased film Paanch. She followed it with his controversial and acclaimed film Black Friday for which she was nominated for a Star Screen Award in 2008.[1] She has also edited Reema Kagti's Honeymoon Travels Pvt. Ltd., Imtiaz Ali's Jab We Met, Rockstar, Tamasha, Highway and Rajkumar Gupta's Aamir, for which she was nominated for her second Star Screen Award.[2] Later, she edited Kashyap's Dev.D, Gulaal, Ugly, Raman Raghav 2.0, Mukkabaaz, Sacred Games and Manmarziyaan. An article on The Hindu describes her as "one of those rare new-age film editors who lets the narrative breathe, supremely confident of her pacing."
In the same article, Bajaj describes her process of deciding which film she wants to contribute to. It is true that many of her works are films which are different from what one expects from the average Bollywood movie. She answers in The Hindu interview, "I enjoy mainstream Bollywood, but I don't know if I can edit them. What's the point of doing the same formula again? What do you look forward to? I know I will go brain-dead." She also adds, "I like quirky, I like different." She goes on to emphasise the importance of mental stimulation and how every project she does must present to her some sort of challenge. Her professionalism is such that she only does one project at a time to ensure compete focus.
Bajaj has worked on films across different genres, from Rockstar to Sacred Games, which demand different editing styles, and has proved herself to be a versatile editor.[3]