Riteish Deshmukh has a new favourite story about the paps who follow him around, and this one doesn't end with anyone complaining about staged photo-ops.

The actor was walking out of a Mumbai restaurant when a child approached him selling something for Rs 100. Riteish didn't have the cash. Nobody does anymore, really. "You have become so cashless today," he said, explaining that he's stopped carrying money altogether because everything runs on UPI now.

He tried his chauffeur first. No luck. He asked the kid if he took GPay, banking on a QR code somewhere. The kid didn't have one either. That's where things could've just ended, awkward and unresolved, with cameras rolling and traffic building around him.

A Stranger Steps In

Instead, a photographer in the scrum offered to cover it. "Main deta hoon," he told Riteish. The actor didn't catch his name in the moment, though he's since learned it was Sushil Mohite, and adds the usual caveat that he hopes he's got it right.

Riteish tried to get his GPay ID on the spot to pay him back, but between the noise and the crowd there wasn't time. Sushil waved it off. "Nahin, rehne do," he said. Riteish took his picture before getting into the car, which turned out to be the only lead he had.

He posted about it on Instagram once he was inside the vehicle, saying he owed the man and needed to track him down. It worked. He got Sushil's number, called him, and settled the Rs 100.

What's stuck with Riteish isn't the amount, obviously. It's what it says about a relationship that's usually framed one way. "It's always chaotic, getting in and out on the road, and the paps are doing their job," he said. "We always think that they are probably wanting our pictures and they are in need. But we don't realise that there are moments when they step up to help you."

Genelia Deshmukh, who's spent as much time dodging and dealing with the same cameras, backed him up on this being a pattern rather than a one-off. "And we've always had that. Always," she said.

Riteish's closing line does the work of the whole story. "People always say that you're paying paps," he said, laughing. "I was the one who got paid by them."

Whether Sushil Mohite ever got his money is one thing. What's more interesting is how casually this flips the usual paparazzi narrative in Bollywood, where the assumption almost always runs the other way. Riteish didn't need this story to make a point. It just happened to make one anyway.