Akshaye Khanna

Some Lesser Known Facts About Akshaye Khanna

• Does Akshaye Khanna smoke?: Yes

  

• Does Akshaye Khanna drink alcohol?: Yes

• Akshaye hails from a Punjabi family with a rich artistic background as his father, Vinod Khanna, is an acting legend, his mother, Geetanjali Khanna, was one of the best models of her times, and his elder brother, Rahul Khanna, is also a renowned actor.

  

• Before entering into Bollywood, he took acting classes at Kishore Namit Kapoor Acting Institute, Mumbai.

• His father launched him in the romantic film ‘Himalay Putra’ (1997) opposite Anjala Zaveri. His father also wanted to produce another film for his son, but after the failure of the film, Vinod dropped the idea of making the film.

  

• His breakthrough came when he landed the role of “2nd Lt. Dharamvir Singh Bhan” in the film ‘Border’ (1997), a war film based on the “Battle of Longewala” during the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971.

• Initially, Salman Khan, Aamir Khan, Akshay Kumar, Ajay Devgn, and Saif Ali Khan were offered the role of “2nd Lt. Dharamvir Singh Bhan,” but due to various reasons, no one did the role and the role fell in the lap of Akshaye.

  

• Farhan Akhtar initially cast Akshaye Khanna as “Akash,” Hrithik Roshan as “Siddharth” and Saif Ali Khan as “Sameer.” After Hrithik Roshan turned down the role, it went to Abhishek Bachchan. But after Abhishek also turned down the role, Farhan swapped the roles of Akshaye Khanna and Aamir Khan.

• He was the first choice to play Aamir Khan‘s role in ‘Taare Zameen Par’ (2007).

• His best friends in Bollywood are Anil Kapoor, Priyanka Chopra, Arshad Warsi, Kareena Kapoor, Ayesha Takia, Sanjay Kapoor, Saif Ali Khan, Madhuri Dixit, to name a few.

• His portrayal of Harilal Gandhi, Mahatma Gandhi‘s eldest son, in the film ‘Gandhi, My Father’ (2007) is considered one of his best works to date.

• Kareena Kapoor once admitted that she had a huge crush on Akshaye Khanna in her teenage days.

• Anil Kapoor once offered him a role in the TV show ’24’ season 2, but it didn’t excite him.

• In 2016, he made his comeback in Bollywood with John Abraham–Varun Dhawan–Jacqueline Fernandez-starrer ‘Dishoom;’ after a 4-year-long break from acting due to some personal reasons.

• In an interview given in 2017, he said, “I will never get married. I want to live my life alone. I can be in a relationship for sometime but I know I can’t see it lasting for a lifetime.”

• He was the first choice to play the role of Sunil Dutt in ‘Sanju’ (2018), but he was rejected; as he failed the look tests.

• In 2019, Akshaye portrayed the role of Manmohan Singh‘s former media adviser Sanjaya Baru in the biographical political film ‘The Accidental Prime Minister.’