Our Bridal Party
Archana Ravinuthala
Bridesmaid
While Archana has had the "pleasure" of knowing Abhishek since the day she was born, she met Sahanna for the first time shortly after Abhishek and Sahanna began dating. When Abhishek first introduced Sahanna to his family, Sahanna instantly felt a connection with Archana. Excitingly, Archana recently moved to Columbus to attend Ohio State for college. Since they now lived in the same city, they were able to spend some quality time together, attending events such as Navratri Garba-Raas and the Columbus Lantern Festival. Sahanna feels lucky to be able to call Archana a sister and cannot wait to celebrate with her and for all the memories still to come!
Alison Brandel
Bridesmaid
Alison and Sahanna were randomly-assigned as freshman college roommates, but it didn't take long to realize that it was a perfect match! Between hallway nerf gun wars and Papa John's pizza nights, they always found ways to have fun together. As Sahanna got to know Alison, she also had the honor of getting to know Alison's wonderful then-boyfriend (now husband), Austin, and often joked about living in the attic of their future house because she would miss them too much after graduation! Over the next four years of college, they experienced it all, sharing in their mutual love for tacos & margaritas, New Girl, and creating many memories at their campus apartment, affectionately titled 'The Shambly Shack'.
Divya Raj
Bridesmaid
Divya and Sahanna met in college through various involvement in South-Asian student organizations. When they both realized that they had been accepted to the MPH graduate program at Columbia University, they jumped at the opportunity to live together. Over the next few years, Divya and Sahanna became close friends as they navigated city life, apartment fun, and graduate school together, making many memories along the way that often involved cheese & wine, discussing TV shows such as VEEP and Grey's Anatomy, or dealing with their perpetually broken down apartment. Sahanna is very thankful to Divya for introducing her to the scrumptious snack of queso and chips.
Tara Paranjpe
Bridesmaid
To this day, Tara and Sahanna are still not sure how they never ran into each other as kids, despite growing up in the same community. Thankfully, in the first week of college, they sat next to each other at a dance team tryout information session, and the rest truly became history. Sahanna and Tara quickly realized they were the same kind of "weird" and became the closest of friends through experiences such as co-directing a dance competition and competing on the same dance team. Although they haven't lived in the same city since graduating, whenever they reunite, it feels as if nothing has changed! Fun fact - when together, they are often asked if they are twins!
Seema Keswani
Bridesmaid
Seema and Sahanna met during orientation at Columbia Mailman graduate school during an introductory small-group session. They soon realized that they shared many mutual friends, and it wasn't too long before they became close friends! Over the next few years, Seema and Sahanna spent lots of time together between studying and exploring everything New York City had to offer, sharing in their mutual love for new exciting experiences and fun weekend activities out in the city. They can often be found musing and planning out the the next reunion idea for their Columbia graduate school friends group!
Mihika Gulati
Bridesmaid
Sahanna met Mihika through her boyfriend, Aditya (one of Abhishek's groomsmen), and immediately knew she had met a friend for life! Despite sadly never living in the same city, they always have a blast together when they see each other in person and can always be found chatting about zen, yoga, and healthy foods/recipes or discussing the most recent popular reality show on Netflix. Sahanna hopes one day she and Mihika will live closer to each other so that they can do these things together way more often.
Shweta Athilat
Bridesmaid
On the first week of graduate school, Sahanna knew she wanted to join a dance club and asked if anyone wanted to go to auditions together - Shweta volunteered to come along and the rest was history! Between studying together for epidemiology classes (they conducted a very important analysis on the association between diabetes and pesticides), joining a local NYC Bollywood dance team, brainstorming a new restaurant to try before weekly dance practices, and, on the rare occasion, re-prioritizing their schedules to chase Bollywood celebrity sightings, Shweta and Sahanna became the closest of buds and nothing has changed since!
Laveena Sehgal
Bridesmaid
Sahanna and Laveena met through the incoming Class of 2015 Ohio State Facebook group, and by the time they arrived on campus, they already knew they were going to be the closest of pals and were inseparable! Sahanna had no idea that her first friend at college would end up becoming one of her oldest friendships, one that never had any shortage of things to talk about between Bollywood gossip, dreams and goals for the future, and mutual friendship values. Sahanna will never forget their post-graduation backpacking trip to Spain where they spent most of their time hopping between tapas bars and cannot wait for the next time they get to take a trip together.
Insiya Taj
Bridesmaid
Sahanna met Insiya during orientation week of graduate school in NYC and immediately felt drawn to her fun-loving nature, adventurous spirit, and hard-working ethic! Outside of being study buddies for infectious disease epidemiology classes, they spent lots of time together trying new foods, sharing recipes, or bonding over a mutual wanderlust and desire to see all corners of the world. They continue to bond over their shared career/passions in population health and analytics and are always excited for the next time that they get to reunite in person and catch up!
Basma Rustom
Bridesmaid
Basma was Sahanna's very first friend at graduate school - they immediately clicked after meeting during orientation week and became close pals soon after. Thankfully, they both had very similar class schedules and were able to study, share notes, and, occasionally, struggle with the chaos that was the Columbia MPH program, together. Basma and Sahanna even got to work together at the NYC Department of Health on "Team Salmonella", a very elite force of foodborne disease surveillance interns, allowing them to further bond and share in the "joys" of commuting on the NYC subway.
Dhruthi Raghavendran
Bridesmaid
Dhruthi, or Dru as she is more affectionately known, and Sahanna met through Ashwin (one of Abhishek's groomsmen). Within a few times of hanging out with Dru, Sahanna knew that she had made a buddy for life and felt very thankful to have another person to vote 'yes' for Bollywood movie nights and cheesecake when friends get together. They hope that one day they might finally manage to watch two of their Bollywood favorites - Om Shanti Om and Bhool Bhulaiya - from start to finish, together.
Eshan Bhatt
Groomsman
Abhishek and Eshan, or affectionately Eshu, hit it off right away. An intellectual personality, Eshu enjoys dissecting various topics, and from the beginning they always liked to tear into discussions including Marvel vs DC, politics, scientific literature, and pretty much anything else you can think of. Eshu is also an aspiring medical student and Abhishek has been helping him along the way in whatever way he can. Abhishek has really enjoyed getting to know Eshu over the last couple years and looks forward to being family - and brothers!
Prithvi Jami
Groomsman
Abhishek and Prithvi have known each other since childhood, and as such he has seen the most of any groomsman, unfortunately for Abhishek. They first met when Abhishek moved to Mason 14 years ago and their families hit it off. They've remained the best of friends through the years, sharing everything from RuneScape to collegiate misadventures. Today their favorite hobbies include playing smash brothers, irritating Sahanna with inane jokes, and bonding over the sweet nectar of Huel. The great thing about Prithvi is he is just about the "chillest" fellow you'll ever meet. It's not clear if he's capable of being fazed, which makes him really easy to talk to. Also, he's really odd. Just ask him about his preference for listening to malfunctioning refrigerators as "music". Also Bleep Bloop.
Aditya Batchu
Groomsman
Abhishek met Aditya, or Adi for short, 5 years ago through Prithvi, with whom he had gone to college. Aditya had just moved to Cincinnati to start a job at P&G. He quickly became one of the Cincy crew, and before long, crashing at Adi's after a night out became the go to plan for the gang on countless nights in their early twenties. With his infectious energy and penchant for Jäger bombs and investment banking, there's never a boring time with him around. At the same time Aditya is a very warm and loyal friend with strong principles. You can always count on Aditya for consistency and fairness. Also his taste in movies is tops and includes must-watch classics like Happy New Year. Unfortunately, the man unfortunately has absolutely no respect for people's bananas and burritos.
Ashwin Datar
Groomsman
Ashwin is the quintessential friend. From their early teens when they first met, Ashwin has always been the best companion Abhishek could have hoped for. He's always stuck by him in the worst of times and celebrated with him in the best of times. Ashwin is really unique in the sense that there isn't really anything that doesn't interest him. He can get excited about virtually any topic of discussion or activity, which makes it incredibly easy to connect with him. A true patron of the arts, Ashwin's favorite hobbies including stuffing his face, weight training, and arguing about, well anything. Of course, Abhishek is always ready to join in-much to everyone else's dismay. Overall, Ashwin is the guy you can count on no matter what.
Mahad Raheel
Groomsman
Abhishek met Mahad met in the first week of medical school. They became fast friends, bonding over their shared love of memes, travel, and the deep suffering that is medical school. If there's one thing that stands out about Mahad it's that he is phenomenal company. So much so that within a year of meeting him, Abhishek and he went to Europe to celebrate the end of their first year of med school. One of the things that makes hanging out with Mahad so entertaining is his incredible talent for making anything funny through ridiculous absurdist mocking commentary. As goofy and silly as he is, Mahad is also a complex man who deeply appreciates music, politics, art, nature, and history. He's also always up for a discussion, particularly about his never-ending obsession with the Ottoman Empire.
Sean Ryan
Groomsman
Sean is a character, and an incredibly good sport. Abhishek and Sean first met in early medical school, where Sean was promptly appalled by Abhishek's apartment and strange sense of humor. However, with continued exposure to the circus that is the Cincinnati crew, he has definitely learned to mess around, which has revealed some pretty interesting stuff about the man: Sean is an absolute party animal. You'd never guess it meeting him, but this guy is always up to get crazy, even more than Abhishek, which is saying something! Jokes aside, Sean is truly one of the most kind-hearted and well-meaning people you'll ever meet; he's always looking for ways to be more considerate and good to the people he cares about.
Rex Bray
Groomsman
Mr. Rex Bray is one of the most striking personalities you'll ever meet. Abhishek and Rex first met at the end of their freshman year at UK where they went to college. Since then it was a bit of a blur, filled with every collegiate misadventure you could imagine, from laughs, fights, and the occasional abandoned Papa Johns cheese stick turned blue. The two of them ended up becoming roommates their junior year which turned out to be an absolutely wild ride. Now Abhishek is a pretty intense guy, but Rex is a totally different level which made for some pretty crazy experiences! The two of them enjoy bonding over inebriated political discussion, musing on bread-cake equivalency, stuffing themselves with late night Doughby's, and annoying their beloved roommate Sarah Ferrell :).