Sonal with John in Tony's next

Tony D'Souza, the director of the much-discussed Blue who has worked with beauties like Katrina Kaif, Lara Dutta and Kylie Minogue in his first film, has zeroed in on Sonal Chauhan to play the lead in his second film which will be an action-adventure drama with John Abraham in the lead.

So taken up was the director by the pretty actress that he couldn't muster the courage to approach her....until Sonal who came to know of Tony's film, made the first move. Laughs Sonal, "Yes we've met about the film and I'm doing Tony's film."

Not much has been heard of the reclusive Jannat girl Sonali Chauhan. After saying no to a number of projects including the Bhatts" Jashan, Sonali finally surfaced in Punjab for the shooting of M.F Husain"s son Owais Husain"s film. Only to suffer a painful burn injury.

Speaking from Chandigarh the plucky girl tried to laugh her pain away. “It could"ve been much worse. There I was on a crane, heading towards touching the sky when these two floodlights came close to my face. No one had any idea how warm the light was. By the time I was brought down the damage had already been done. I was singed and in pain."

Luckily medical help was at hand. “You know more care is taken during these backwater outstation shootings. I"m now well on the way to recovery. And I love Chandirgarh. I don"t want to leave this place although our schedule is nearly over," says Sonal who completed a Kannada film after Jannat and was waiting for the right Hindi project.

“The moment I heard of Owais" project I knew this was what I wanted to do. I didn"t care how commercial it sounded. It just sounded right for me. I"ve always done what I instinctively felt to be right."

About turning down the Bhatts after they had given her a break like Jannat, Sonal protests, “I wouldn"t say I turned them down. It was just not what I wanted to do at that time. Now I hear Mahesh Bhatt Saab himself has directed Jashan. So it must have turned out really special."

Like it or not, Sonal came into the industry in a flurry of controversies. There were scandal about an abusive boyfriend turned stalker, and public scenes with him.

Has this incident put Sonal off love for good? “You"re going by the outside perception of what I went through, that wasn"t love at all. And I"m certainly not off love. I"m just too much into my work right now to think about anything else. I got a dream launch in Jannat. And I couldn"t allow that rare opportunity to be wasted," says the Rajput girl who is about the launch her own website.

And that brings us to the latest controversy in Sonal"s career. Apparently someone had launched a fake website pretending to be Sonal Chauhan.

“When I heard about it I couldn"t let it go because I was launching my own website. I put my lawyers on to the imposter. We tracked the ulprit down and brought him to book. I think it"s very important for known people in our entertainment industry to stand up against cyber crimes. We take them too casually and encourage hackers and imposters."