‘People think I’m a smart businessman, a successful entrepreneur… …IT’S ALL CRAP’

Shah Rukh Khan has managed to combine Bollywood and sports like never before, and on his own terms too. BT gets up, close and personal with the Badshah of entertainment

If you’ve really made it big in Bollywood, you’re a star. Ditto for cricket. But if you’ve really made it big in Bollywood AND cricket, what would you be? That question hasn’t had a chance to pop up all these years – till now. Till one Mr Khan put his money where his mouth was and supercharged the game with star power. After Shah Rukh – whose presence at cricket stadia raised officious eyebrows till some time ago – stepped in, the rules of the game, to use a cliche, just got rewritten.

SRK doesn’t think it’s a change of track, though – merely a natural extension. “But I have always done it… been interested in and backed sports, that is. Once the basics of life are in place, in any society, increasing consumerism promotes entertainment, and the final foray in entertainment is towards sports as entertainment. I am primarily an entertainer, and maybe somewhere I am a frustrated sportsman myself. I wish I could have carried on, but because of injuries etc, I couldn’t.” Seems true enough – for someone whose core competence is entertainment, he’s the unquestioned mascot of hockey, post Chak De India. He’s seen at polo and golf tourneys with increasing frequency, and pitched in for good friend Mallya to create buzz for the latter’s F1 team. His presence at cricket stadia and his equation with the cricketing fraternity precede his current IPL drive. And soccer lovers expect him to pitch in to promote soccer in Bengal with his team’s revenues.

But the current venture is big money. Smart investor or a dreamer pursuing a sporting passion? “It’s more about dreams than business,” he says. “People only look at the successes that I have had and think I’m a skilled businessman. It’s all crap. I have faced a lot of failures. When I first started my production company, everyone wrote it off. When Phir Bhi Dil Hai Hindustani was released, it was written off instantly, and I remember headlines that said ‘Dreams turn into nightmares’, ‘Dreams gone down in dumps’. And I started an internet company that went into nothing, complete zilch.”

Granted, but hasn’t he come to the point where he IS a megabucks investor? “See, even when I have failed, I haven’t taken a loan, for my business sense says, never a borrower be. I believe in what my mother told me – pair utne phailao jitni chadar hai. So whenever I have had the chadar fall short, I have tried to stretch it by working more, by dancing more, doing whatever it takes… but making sure that whoever has done a job with me, gets value for money. I’m old fashioned when it comes to money. I don’t even take an advance for a film that I do. I don’t do a business if I can’t afford it. Even the IPL investment – I have only been able to do because of all the guys who have come aboard and put in money with me. Hopefully, I will not lose here.”

Is the funda about not borrowing money inspired by what superstars who have borrowed in the past have faced? Maybe, maybe not. Where’s the money coming from currently? “All the money that I got from Paanchvi Paas…, I have
put into this project, just the way I took
all the money I got from KBC and
put it into OSO. Always, the money goes back into work.” Always? “Yes. As a person, I am still very middle class. People don’t realise these things. Most of the black suits that I wear are the same. All the designer clothes I have are actually from my films. I don’t dream of Rolls Royce and things like that… People are kind enough to me to give me the nicest things in life, but it doesn’t mean that I’m used to them.”

How big a brand do you want to be? “I don’t know what it means to be a brand… I do things exactly the way I have always done them. I sometimes read The Economic Times and figure out how big a brand I am, but the basics of brand building are the oldest cliches our parents tell us – be hardworking, be honest to yourself, be happy, and whoever you meet, make them feel they’re special.”

While on parents, he also says he’s “like a child”. He doesn’t feel older, then? “I was shooting for an ad recently and there was a huge poster of Dil To Pagal Hai there, and I went and took a picture of myself standing next to it. You know, I think I look younger now than I did in that poster! I think like a kid, I’d like to be a kid all my life.”

‘‘‘If I am able to create a sporting platform, I’d like If Aamir was serious (about my being no 2), it It will take more than a lifetime to say to get into any sport which requires support, not doesn’t require an answer. If he was being funny, I ‘thank you’ to all the people who’ve been kind to just cricket or soccer. Privatisation of sports in appreciate it. Though frankly, I liked his ‘ekka’ me. I can’t repay emotional debts. So India is interesting. In fact, it’s necessary response to my being Badshah much better what can I do? I’ll die entertaining you…

toi