Rajesh Khanna always thought, 'Why should I talk nicely to this person or why respect him?,' reveals former child actor Master Raju

Rajesh Khanna refused to recognise Master Raju as well despite having worked with him in the past.

• Rajesh Khanna insisted Akshay Kumar come to him, citing family hierarchy
• Master Raju recalls Khanna's refusal to acknowledge him during their adult work
• Khanna would only arrive on set if fetched personally by the producer

Did our AI summary help?

Bollywood's first superstar, Rajesh Khanna, was known to have starry tantrums and it is an open secret. Now former child actor Master Raju, aka Raju Shrestha, has revealed more anecdotes about the veteran actor.

In an interview with Siddharth Kannan, Raju recalled the time when Rajesh Khanna refused to go and meet his son-in-law and superstar Akshay Kumar.

Raju said the late superstar Rajesh Khanna always believed in and maintained his rigid sense of hierarchy even with his family members.

He revealed in the interview that Rajesh Khanna was informed about Akshay Kumar at their home and the superstar was believed to have refused to go downstairs to meet Akki and instead insisted that the actor should come and meet him.

“I have heard another instance about him when Akshay Kumar went to his home to meet him, and Rajesh Khanna was sitting upstairs in some room, and somebody informed him that Akshay Kumar had come to meet him. His reaction was, ‘Main uska sasur hoon, woh aayega mere paas, main kyun jaoon (I am his father-in-law, he will come to me, why should I go?)'," said Raju.

Also Read: Nora Fatehi backs Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl halftime show amid mixed reactions: ‘Brought tears in my eyes’

Akshay Kumar is married to Rajesh Khanna and Dimple Kapadia’s elder daughter, Twinkle Khanna. The two tied the knot in 2001.

Rajesh Khanna believed in hierarchy 

Raju also said that Rajesh Khanna believed in hierarchy and had this attitude that why should he be respectful towards others. "He had this attitude. I don’t know why, but he would think, "Why should I talk nicely to this person or why should I give him respect?" he recalled.

Master Raju had worked with Rajesh Khanna as a child actor but the actor recalls the time when he worked with him for a movie as an adult actor; the late superstar refused to recognize or acknowledge him.

“Rajesh Khanna worked in a serial, and I worked in the direction team of that show, so I would meet him regularly at his office. Still, he refused to recognize me. After a year of working with him, one day, he called me by my name. I was surprised that he knows my name, and when I asked the director about it, he confirmed that the veteran actor recognizes me, and he also often talks about me and how he has worked with me when I was a child artist, but Rajesh Khanna never showed this to me," said Raju.

Rajesh Khanna's tantrums on the film sets 

Raju also revealed Rajesh Khanna's on-set behavior during the shoot of Palkon Ki Chhaon Mein and that the actor would only come to the set if he was fetched by the producer himself.

“During the shooting of the film, Palkon Ki Chhaon Mein at China Creek, that area at that time was outside Bombay and there was a single dirt track that went to that area. All the actors, including Hema Malini and myself, would reach in the morning. Rajesh Khanna was the lead actor of the film, so the producer used to go to his house to fetch him. We used to keep sitting and waiting for him.”

Rajesh Khanna died at the age of 69 on July 18, 2012, at his Mumbai home. He was suffering from liver cancer at the time of his death. He is survived by his estranged wife Dimple Kapadia and two daughters Twinkle and Rinke Khanna.