Dhananjaya is an Indian actor, writer, producer, and lyricist, who earned fame after playing the role of antagonist Daali in the film Tagaru.Dhananjaya was a brilliant student and scored 95.32% marks in the SSLC Board examination. His photo was also printed in the newspaper.After completing school, he got a job as a software engineer in Infosys. Following his passion for acting, he dropped the job and joined theatre GPIER.He had also worked in German theatres under Christian Stuckl, a German theatre artist.After doing theatre shows, he entered Kannada cinema, Sandalwood, when he was first recognised by a Kannada director Guruprasad, who offered him a lead role in one of his films.Dhananjaya is a hardworking actor. He practised very hard for his film Boxer and learnt classical dance and to play Mridanga for his role in the film Allam Prabhu.Although his performance and acting were appreciated by many people, he was not able to make a mark by his acting. A turning point came in his career when he was offered the role of an antagonist (Daali) in the film Tagaru. After the release of the film, he is most famous as Daali among his fans.After playing the character Daali, he did several negative roles in the films like Yajamana, Yuvarathna, and many more, giving back to back hits.Dhananjaya shared in an interview that he got the role of Daali while having a casual talk with Duniya Suri, at the gym. [4]Deccan Chronicle Sharing that incident he said, It all took off-note of a lighter note while I first met Suri sir at the gym. Since he was impressed with my works in the past, we started talking about films. All of it happened on the treadmill while we were sweating it out. He was curious to know what kind of role I was looking at, and my response was anything that made sense. Within minutes, he said I will be doing a role in his upcoming film. When I learnt that I will be playing a villain, I was surprised but I had confidence in him that it will be a challenging one..Dhananjaya said in an interview that he loves to be called Daali by his fans and always takes it as a compliment. He added, I feel honoured that people loved me as the don Daali. At the same time, I want to be known as an actor who can do any kind of role and not be limited to one style. That is why I make it a point to choose films where I get to explore kinds of roles..