Renowned filmmaker Karan Johar followed in the footsteps of his father, the late Yash Johar, in making films. He started his career with the 1995 film Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge, in which he was an assistant director and then went on to make many memorable films, spanning more than two decades, starting with Kuch Kuch Hota Hai.
The director of Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge Aditya Chopra is one of Karan’s closest friends, however, you will be surprised to know that they weren’t really that tight back in their childhood, as revealed by Karan himself in his memoir, An Unsuitable Boy.
Growing up as the son of one of Bollywood’s leading producers, Karan had a lot of star kids as friends in his formative years. In his memoir, he writes that he knew Hrithik Roshan, Abhisekh Bachchan, Shweta Bachchan, Zoya Akhtar and Farhan Akhtar since childhood and hung out a lot with them while adding that he was closer to Shweta and Zoya. However, he did not like Aditya in his childhood and the reason is amusing.
Aditya always spoke in Hindi and according to Karan, back then he found it to be ‘downmarket and uncool’. He even said that he complained to his mother Hiroo Johar about Aditya only speaking in Hindi and asked him to not invite Aditya to their home. “I did not find it cool to talk in Hindi like this continuously. I told my mother that I will not talk to these children,” he said in his memoir.
It is interesting to note that Karan and Aditya are also related. Karan’s mother Hiroo Johar is the sister of Aditya’s father Yash Chopra, making the two filmmakers, cousins.
