Shah Rukh Khan’s all-time favourite role only paid him Rs 25,000

Kabhi Haan Kabhi Naa has an unconventional narrative where the lead actor is actually a naïve, manipulative loser. (Screen grab/ Red Chillies Entertainment)

It has been 30 years since the release of the late Kundan Shah’s Kabhi Haan Kabhi Naa. Even 30 years after it first released, the film is considered one of Shah Rukh Khan’s own favourite roles. In an interview in 2006, Khan claimed that he was so enamoured with the film and its treatment that he wished he had made it as a ‘producer’. In the film, Khan played a plucky musician with a never-say-die attitude in love with Anna (Suchitra Krishnamoorthi), something that echoes his own personal journey from the relatively unremarkable landscape of urban New Delhi to the highs of Mumbai’s skylines.

Incredibly, Khan was paid a mere Rs 25,000 for the film, that the director of the film Kundan Shah claimed was a minor miracle. According to Shah, almost everyone who worked on the film was jobless at the time. And even though the film had been completed in 1992 itself, it couldn’t be released right away because 10 percent had to postponed because of Khan’s absence due to dates.

When asked in an interview if Sunil is the kind of character that he relates with most, Khan said: “I wish I was Sunil. But I don’t have his innocence and his purity.” To an entire generation perhaps, this iconic film remains unknown because it pre-dated Khan’s NRI/romance phase that took Hindi cinema by storm. An unconventional narrative where the lead actor is actually a naïve, manipulative loser, this film has stood the test of the time and is likely to relevant for years to come.