SALMAN KHAN:I have my mother's eyes

Salman Khan meets us the evening after release of Kick. Like any other day, he has slept well through the morning, had his lunch with his family, been for his heavy workout and then sits down hungry to talk to us. With his favourite food kept in front of him, the first thing he tells me is, "I am more interested in eating right now than doing this interview." He tried his best to also distract me into eating with him, but we somehow managed.

Excerpts of our conversation with him and his friend and director of Kick, Sajid Nadiadwala.

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Conversation with Salman Khan:

What do you do on Eid?
I do on Eid what I do on any other festive day, spend time with family and pray for longevity of life for them. It's a day I can go off that non-carb diet and pray from the bottom of my heart in my way. That's it. In our house, we
celebrate everything. We celebrate even a festival called disaster. We also celebrate the success of other people. We celebrate our own failure. We, as a family, find something each day to celebrate.

Every son has something about their mother they love.
I have my mother's eyes though I grew up on my mother's nerves. My mother can actually handle anything. Her tolerance for pain is substantial. Like her, I think I have that quality of standing up laughing and then standing up after a broken leg. She once fell down many stairs and we all got hassled that mummy had fallen. But can you imagine, we ran down and saw her laughing. I asked her, 'Theek ho?' She said, 'Haan, theek hoon.' Then dad came. He said, 'What happened?' She said, 'I fell and have broken my foot.' When we saw her leg, it had been broken into 8-10 pieces. Dad says, 'You have put on so much weight. You will get saved but to lift you, your husband and son may get a heart attack.' She was in bed for about six months. She cooks and right now she is getting ready all the ingredients for sevaiyyan and sheer khurma for Eid for everybody.

Your childhood memory of Eid?
We were always told, 'If you don't behave yourself, we will not take you out.' It's not that I do my namaaz everyday, but I try to pray in my mind all the time. I work and whenever I get the time, I think of Him and I try and do the right things all the time. I believe in Him and a power that is there above all of us. Now, I will pray the Eid ki namaaz where you get up in the morning and pray with the whole jamaat. I do it differently. I keep on repeating the words in my mind and the translation for everything in my mind in Hindi or English, as Arabic is a language which you are reading but not understanding it. My pronunciation of Arabic may not
be perfect, so I say the meaning too after that. As kids, it used to be an outing. Invariably, someone or the other would get up late and we would miss the namaaz at one place, then go to the other and sometimes miss it at all places and come back home and then read it together, blaming each other for it. But it was so much fun. Most of the times, the defaulter was Sohail, I think, as he was always chilled out. As kids we used to get 25 paise or 50 paise as Eidi. As we are growing older, we get such a big phatka. I just don't like this Eid and Rakhi as between these two sisters and two rakhi sisters, it's more than enough. I have decided to have no more sisters. Aisa tagda phatka padta hai, and then they will tell you, you are Salman Khan so you have to give more. They don't agree below a lakh at at least. They will put rakhis on your whole hand. Every year, they want you to give more and then if you have had a hit, the amount will be even higher, so it's not fun any more.

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How do you deal with the expectations from Kick?
I feel good about the film. My experience throughout the film is not going to change basis the box office numbers. So, however the film goes, I have had a great journey making this film. There are two ways of looking at it. Ek dua maango, ki bahut badi hit hoye. Jab flop ho jaye toh dua maango ki kum se kum flop ho. Thoda sa aur dede. Thoda sa aur dede. Please thoda sa aur dede Allah. We get greedy ki Allah hume maaf kar de, hum greedy ho gaye they. Itna nahi maangna chahiye tha. You start making deals with Allah. You say, 'I will leave this,' then you say, 'Nahi yeh nahi, woh nahi karoonga,' and then finally you say, 'Koshish karoonga for 4 days' I have never done a bargain with God. I very rarely ask itself because he knows everything toh maangna kya. I always ask for others ki kum se kum taqleef de unko. A film's success is a combination of hard work, prayers and people wanting to work with you, which means that you are good people who don't have enemies. Also God has given you a brain, so don't make a bad film, as don't expect a film to do well if it is shitty.

Your relationship with God...

We are respectful when it comes to our parents and bosses. We expect fans to behave themselves when they meet us. Even to meet a small-time politician, we are willing to stand in a line and go through security. Par upar waale se toh baat karte hain jaisa kuch bhi nahi. Har aadmi se baat karne mein phat jaati hai, but upar waale se baat karne mein we go Allahhh. Yaar Allah, tere se baat karte hain, yeh kya chakkar hai yaar? That the power that has made the world we talk to so easily with so much right and authority, we sulk with him, get angry, just imagine if you were to do that with a person with much lesser power. I don't understand that funda. The politeness and respect should be so much more with Allah. When someone talks to us even a little badly, we will say badtameez hain and get irritated. If a fan out of excitement calls at 2 at night, we feel angry. But imagine Allah, we say whatever we want to him at any time. Kya baat hai. He must also be feeling like we do and must also be wanting to hit us, but he doesn't. I feel blessed because if I make a mistake I get instant result for it.

It seems that it has become important for you to play a good person in a film. Is that true?

Yes it's an important criteria. I think, this has to look cooler than the negative guy. There was a time when being a good man was a cool thing, then there came an era where looking negative became cool. I never went into that zone. You make negative stuff look cool and that is what is followed. I may do grey characters, but try and do the right thing on screen. Today in our society even if there is a genuinely good guy, people will think he can't be like that. He must be a gamer, a planner. That is not nice just because he is not like you and is genuinely good.

What next?
I go back to playing Prem in Soorajji's film. When I was refreshing the script in my mind I was thinking that I have been in a banyan more in his film than in any other film. I got a call yesterday from his office saying, 'We need to shoot the pool sequence after you return.' I was eating my chocolate at that time, but listening to that I kept my chocolate down.

Why don't you have a bare body shot in Kick?
We had Nawazuddin in our film. Nawazuddin koh marne ke liye shirt utarne ki zaroorat hi nahi hai. The optional weapons we were looking out for to hit him were like a needle,
a nail cutter, a bobpin even a toothpick. We knew even seeing a toothpick he will run away:

Conversation with the director of Kick, Sajid Nadiadwala:


What does Eid signify in your life?
It was different earlier when dad was there. We looked up to him and sometimes needed to be dragged for namaaz as Eid is a holiday. But today, I am the dad of my house and my kids look upto me now as I am the eldest in the family. So I have to go for namaaz now. Eid is also a time when I miss my dad a lot and remember him.

Has your family seen the film?
During Ramzan time, all the women observe strictness in our house. All three generations in my house (my grandmother, mother and wife) are praying for the film's success, but have not seen the film yet but they are dying to see it and will see it on Eid. Right now, they are holding back and giving their qurbani to Allah. But, of course, since they hear me talking on the phone, in between reading the namaaz, they will come and ask me the box office numbers and then go back to their namaaz I feel my life is like a duck where you only see me from above floating, but actually, the feet below the water doing all the work is their prayers.

Any memory associated with Eid?
Earlier, the nice things were buying clothes one week in advance and getting your Eidi from your elders. In our religion, as per Quran, it is defined that we need to give 2% of our earnings (Zakat) of whatever we make to the needy during the holy month of Ramzan. A few years back, my '30-40 lakhs cash got stolen. Everyone told me that with filmi people, the money never comes back. But I had faith. I said, 'I have paid my zakat and every penny will come back to me.' It is there in my Quran. Everyone laughed at me, but can you imagine the thief not only returned back my money ,but did not even take out '100 from it for his food. So I feel zakat is there to protect your interest in life.

It's been a great year for you first with success in Highway, 2 States and Heropanti as a producer and now with Kick as a producer-director.
Salim uncle said, 'Takhdeer paise laati hai, dimaag gawati hai.' It's so true. For so many years I have been working so hard working 18-19 hours a day, nothing happened. This year I have been so involved with just Kick, but did not work hard on my other films and yet they have done so well. With Kick I turned director only due to Salman and so he was the first person I wanted to please. But what is nice is that not just him, but the audience is liking the film. I am not directing a film for the next few years and will be standing in queue waiting for only Salman to do my next film.