The rise and rise of SRK !

Shah Rukh Khan's meteoric rise from the bylanes of Rajinder Nagar in Delhi to the palatial Mannat at Mumbai's Bandstand is a tale that cannot be told in a jiffy.

Hence, Zoom TV is doing an eight-part series on Shah Rukh Khan called The Rise and Rise of Shah Rukh Khan, starting off at 7 pm on June 18. Zoom TV, which has now established itself as the rightful owners of Bollywood content, traces how Peshawar's Meer Taj Mohammed Khan reached Delhi and how Shah Rukh Khan was born to him and his wife Lateef Fatima Khan at Talwar Nursing Home.

The Rise and Rise of Shah Rukh Khan also traces how Shah Rukh Khan dribbled from hockey to football and from the remote controlled form of theatre into television before projecting himself on the big screen.

As one of his relatives has said on the show, "His mother was concerned about how he would fare in his studies, with so many activities in his kitty."

How the actor was initially dismissed as a by-product of television... But he stammered his way into the limelight with Darr... and K...K...K...Kiran came in as a ray of light into his life.

A film like Dil Aashna Hai pulled him back, but haar kar jeetne waale ko hi Baazigar kehte hain. The actor refused to be written off, even as the anjaam of another of his anti-hero films – Anjaam – at the Box Office was as tragic as the film's climax.

The Rise and Rise of Shah Rukh Khan then goes on to explain how Yash Raj's Raj carried off his bride Simran to simmering success at the Box Office and how a romantic stepped into the limelight. As Ritiesh Deshmukh has said on the show, "Shah Rukh Khan taught us how to romance."

As SRK rose meteorically, he developed a back problem. He even hobbled on his sets with a walking stick, and had to go to bed early to deal with the painkillers.

But the actor rose like the proverbial phoenix. He worked on his back problem and packed off his critics with his six-pack abs at age 42, survived the dard and revived the disco with Dard-e-disco.

A feat that could not have been possible for anyone but a man like SRK, who clearly knew that he wanted to be No 1, the superstar whom everyone would love. Truly a feat that got us saying... it is indeed the rise and rise of Shah Rukh Khan.

As his acting guru Barry John says, "What is miraculous is that he is from Delhi, from a non-filmi background, and he achieved the fairytale story. None of us imagined that he could do so. How can one predict the future like that?"