Shah Rukh Khan

• 1. Introduction

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  Shah Rukh Khan, known to fans by the initials SRK, has a following that one estimate puts above one billion people. A popularity survey claimed that 3.2 billion people worldwide know his name, more than know Tom Cruise. In Thailand he goes by "Bird Bombay". The nickname compares his fame in India to that of Thongchai McIntyre, a Thai superstar whose own nickname is Bird. Khan is an Indian actor and film producer who has appeared in more than 90 films in Hindi cinema. The media calls him "King Khan" and the "Baadshah of Bollywood". How did one boy grow into a star of that size? Why did he build his early career on killers and obsessive lovers? And what does a king do when his films stop working?

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• 2. Roots and Schooling

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  Mir Taj Mohammed Khan, the father of Shah Rukh Khan, was an independence activist from Peshawar. He campaigned alongside the Khudai Khidmatgar, a nonviolent resistance movement led by Abdul Ghaffar Khan. The movement sought a united and independent India. Mir followed Abdul Ghaffar Khan and was affiliated with the Indian National Congress. His cousin Shah Nawaz Khan was a major general in the Indian National Army.

  In 1946, Mir moved to Delhi to study law at Delhi University. Partition in 1947 forced him to stay in the city, and he did not return to Peshawar for many years. In 1959 he married Lateef Fatima, a magistrate and the daughter of a senior government engineer.

  The family's origins are disputed. Khan has said that his paternal grandfather, Mir Jan Muhammad Khan, was a Pashtun from Afghanistan. His paternal cousins in Peshawar later said otherwise. They explained that the family speaks Hindko, a language related to Punjabi, and came originally from Kashmir. Khan understands and speaks Hindko, though not fluently. As of 2010, that side of the family still lived in the Shah Wali Qataal area of Peshawar's Qissa Khwani Bazaar.

  On the 2nd of November 1965, a boy was born in New Delhi into a Muslim family and named Shahrukh Khan. He later preferred his name written as Shah Rukh Khan. His first five years were spent in Mangalore, where his maternal grandfather Iftikhar Ahmed served as chief engineer of the port in the 1960s. On Twitter, Khan described himself as "half Hyderabadi (mother), half Pathan (father), and some Kashmiri (grandmother)".

  The family settled in the Rajendra Nagar neighbourhood of New Delhi. His father ran several business ventures, including a restaurant, and the family lived in rented apartments. At St. Columba's School in central Delhi, Khan excelled in his studies and played hockey and football. He received the school's highest award, the Sword of Honour. He first hoped for a career in sports, but a shoulder injury in his early years ended his playing.

  Khan turned to stage plays instead and drew praise for his imitations of Bollywood actors. His favourites were Dilip Kumar, Amitabh Bachchan, and Mumtaz. A childhood friend and acting partner, Amrita Singh, later became a Bollywood actress.

  From 1985 to 1988, Khan studied economics at Hansraj College of the University of Delhi. He spent much of that time at Delhi's Theatre Action Group, studying acting under the director Barry John. After graduating, he cleared the entrance exam for the Indian Institute of Technology, because his mother insisted he try an engineering exam. He then began a master's degree in mass communication at Jamia Millia Islamia but left to pursue acting. The future filmmaker Kabir Khan was a junior there and used Shah Rukh's notes for study. Khan also attended the National School of Drama in Delhi during his early career in Bollywood. In 1988, the same year his time at Hansraj ended, cameras began rolling on his first starring role.

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• 3. Breaking In

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  Dil Dariya, a television series by Lekh Tandon, began shooting in 1988 and was meant to be Khan's first starring role. Production delays intervened. Raj Kumar Kapoor's 1989 series Fauji became his television debut instead. It offered a realistic look at the training of army cadets, and Khan played the lead, Abhimanyu Rai. More work followed in Aziz Mirza's series Circus, which ran in 1989-90, and in Mani Kaul's miniseries Idiot, from 1992. He also took minor parts in Umeed, in Wagle Ki Duniya, and in the English-language television film In Which Annie Gives It Those Ones. Critics compared his look and acting style to those of Dilip Kumar. Khan had no interest in film acting, because he thought he was not good enough.

  In April 1991, Khan changed his mind about film. His father had died of cancer in 1981, and his mother died in 1991 from complications of diabetes. Khan cited the move into film as a way to escape the grief of losing her. His older sister, Shahnaz Lalarukh, born in 1960, fell into a depressed state after their parents died. Khan took on the responsibility of caring for her. She still lives with him and his family in their Mumbai mansion.

  Khan moved from Delhi to Mumbai and was quickly signed to four films. His first offer was Hema Malini's directorial debut, Dil Aashna Hai, and by June he had started his first shoot. Deewana reached cinemas in June 1992. He played the second male lead behind Rishi Kapoor, alongside Divya Bharti. The film was a box office hit and launched his Bollywood career. It earned him the Filmfare Best Male Debut Award.

  The same year brought his first films as male lead. They were Chamatkar, Dil Aashna Hai, and the comedy Raju Ban Gaya Gentleman, the first of many collaborations with the actress Juhi Chawla. The critic Arnab Ray of Daily News and Analysis described the energy of these early roles, picturing Khan "sliding down stairs on a slab of ice, cartwheeling, somersaulting".

  Two box office hits in 1993 brought Khan his strongest notices, and in both he played a villain. In Baazigar he was a murderer, and in Darr an obsessive lover. Baazigar cast him as an ambiguous avenger who kills his girlfriend. Indian audiences were shocked, because the film violated the standard Bollywood formula. Sonal Khullar called the character "the consummate anti-hero". The film began Khan's long run of pairings with the actress Kajol and won him his first Filmfare Award for Best Actor.

  Darr marked Khan's first collaboration with the filmmaker Yash Chopra and his company Yash Raj Films. Audiences loved his stammer and the line "I love you, K-k-k-Kiran". He earned a Filmfare nomination for the Best Villain award but lost to Paresh Rawal for Sir. Also in 1993, a nude scene with Deepa Sahi in Maya Memsaab was partly censored by the Central Board of Film Certification. The ensuing controversy led Khan to avoid such scenes afterward.

  Kabhi Haan Kabhi Naa, a 1994 comedy-drama directed by Kundan Shah, gave Khan a love-struck musician to play. He later named it his favourite role. It won him a Filmfare Critics Award for Best Performance. In a 2004 retrospective, Sukanya Verma of Rediff.com called it his best performance and described him as "spontaneous, vulnerable, boyish, mischievous and acting straight from the heart".

  Anjaam, also from 1994, paired him with Madhuri Dixit. Playing an obsessive lover, he won the Filmfare Award for Best Performance in a Negative Role. At the time, antagonist parts were considered risky for a leading man in mainstream Hindi cinema. Arnab Ray later credited Khan with taking "insane risks" and "pushing the envelope", and said those choices established his career. The director Mukul S. Anand called him "the new face of the industry".

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• 4. The Romantic Hero

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  Seven films carried Khan's name in 1995. The first was Rakesh Roshan's melodramatic thriller Karan Arjun, co-starring Salman Khan and Kajol. It became the second-highest-grossing film of the year in India.

  Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge was Aditya Chopra's first film as director. Khan played a young Non-resident Indian who falls in love with Kajol's character during a trip across Europe. He was reluctant at first to play a lover, yet this film is credited with establishing him as a romantic hero. It was the highest-grossing production of the year in India and abroad. Box Office India declared it an "all time blockbuster". It won ten Filmfare Awards, including the second of Khan's Best Actor awards.

  At the Maratha Mandir theatre in Mumbai, the film was still showing after more than 1000 weeks, as of early 2015. That makes it the longest-running film in the history of Indian cinema. The director and critic Raja Sen judged the performance "effortless, as non-acting".

  In 1996, all four of Khan's releases failed critically and commercially. The following year, Aziz Mirza's romantic comedy Yes Boss, with Aditya Pancholi and Juhi Chawla, earned him a Filmfare Best Actor nomination. Subhash Ghai's diasporic social drama Pardes followed, with Khan as Arjun, a musician facing a moral dilemma. India Today cites it as one of the first major Bollywood pictures to succeed in the United States. His final release of 1997 was Dil To Pagal Hai, his second film with Yash Chopra. He played Rahul, a stage director caught in a love triangle between Madhuri Dixit and Karisma Kapoor. The film won him his third Best Actor award at Filmfare.

  In 1998 Khan took three lead roles and made one special appearance. Duplicate, a Mahesh Bhatt action comedy, gave him a double role opposite Juhi Chawla and Sonali Bendre. It was the first of many collaborations with Yash Johar's company, Dharma Productions. India Today lauded his energy even though the film was not well received. In Dil Se.., the third instalment of Mani Ratnam's trilogy of terror films, he played an All India Radio correspondent infatuated with a mysterious terrorist, played by Manisha Koirala.

  Kuch Kuch Hota Hai, directed by Karan Johar, cast him as a college student in a love triangle with Kajol and Rani Mukerji. The writer Anjana Motihar Chandra called it "the blockbuster of the 1990s". Khan won Best Actor at the Filmfare ceremony for the second consecutive year. He and several critics believed Kajol had overshadowed his performance.

  Mohabbatein, from 2000, was Aditya Chopra's follow-up. Karan Johar's family drama Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham arrived in 2001. Both co-starred Amitabh Bachchan as an authoritarian figure and set the two men against each other in ideological struggles. Public appreciation was wide, and Mohabbatein earned Khan his second Filmfare Critics Award for Best Actor. Khan cites Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham as a turning point in his career. It remained the top-grossing Indian production of all time in the overseas market for the next five years.

  The author Anupama Chopra says these roles made Khan an icon of romance in India, adored especially by teenagers. Yash Chopra, Aditya Chopra, and Karan Johar moulded his image and made him a superstar. Khan became a romantic leading man without ever kissing a co-star on screen. He broke that rule in 2012, after strong urging by Yash Chopra.

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• 5. Range and Risk

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  Devdas, released in 2002, cast Khan as a rebellious alcoholic opposite Aishwarya Rai and Madhuri Dixit. Sanjay Leela Bhansali directed the period romance. It was the most expensive Bollywood film ever made at that time, and it became a box office success. Devdas won 10 Filmfare Awards, including Best Actor for Khan, and a BAFTA Award for Best Film Not in the English Language. Kal Ho Naa Ho followed in 2003. Karan Johar wrote the comedy-drama, set in New York City, and Khan played Aman Mathur, a man with a fatal heart disease. Critics praised its emotional impact on audiences.

  In 2004, Farah Khan made her directorial debut with Main Hoon Na, a masala film that fictionalised India-Pakistan relations. Some commentators saw it as a conscious move away from portraying Pakistan as the constant villain. Yash Chopra's Veer-Zaara had Khan playing an Indian Air Force pilot who falls in love with a Pakistani woman, played by Preity Zinta. It screened at the 55th Berlin Film Festival to critical praise. It was the highest earning film of 2004 in India.

  Swades, meaning "Homeland", was Khan's last release of 2004. Ashutosh Gowariker directed him as a NASA scientist who patriotically returns to India. It was the first Indian picture shot inside the NASA research centre at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The film scholar Stephen Teo calls it an example of "Bollywoodised realism". In December 2013, The Times of India reported that Khan found the shoot so emotionally overwhelming that he had still not watched the film. Derek Elley of Variety found the performance "unsettling", while Jitesh Pillai and other critics judged it his finest acting to date. Khan was nominated for Best Actor at Filmfare for all three of his 2004 releases and won for Swades.

  Chak De! India, from 2007, gave Khan the part of a disgraced hockey player who coaches the Indian women's national team to World Cup success. Khan had played hockey for his university team, and Bhaichand Patel observed that he essentially portrayed himself, a "cosmopolitan, liberal, Indian Muslim". Rajeev Masand of CNN-IBN praised a performance free of Khan's usual trademark quirks, portraying the coach "like a real flesh-and-blood human being". It earned him another Filmfare Award for Best Actor.

  Om Shanti Om, Farah Khan's reincarnation melodrama, arrived the same year. Khan played a 1970s junior artiste who is reborn as a superstar of the 2000s. It became the highest grossing Indian motion picture of 2007, both at home and abroad.

  Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi, from 2008, paired Khan with the debutante Anushka Sharma. He played Surinder Sahni, a shy man with low self-esteem. His love for his young arranged wife drives him to invent a boisterous alter-ego named Raj.

  Khan had refused the role that went to Anil Kapoor in Danny Boyle's Slumdog Millionaire. He began shooting My Name Is Khan instead, his fourth collaboration with Karan Johar and his sixth with Kajol. The film is based on a true story and set against perceptions of Islam after the 11th of September attacks. Khan played Rizwan Khan, a Muslim with mild Asperger syndrome who travels across America to meet the president. To portray the condition without disparagement, he spent several months reading books, watching videos, and talking to people affected by it. The film became one of the highest grossing Bollywood films of all time outside India. It earned his eighth Filmfare Award for Best Actor, equalling the record held by Dilip Kumar.

  Ra.One, directed by Anubhav Sinha in 2011, was Khan's first superhero film. He made it as a favour to his children. A London-based video game designer creates a villainous character who escapes into the real world. Khan played both the designer, Shekhar, and the robotic superhero G.One. Most critics praised the superhero and faulted the designer. It was billed as Bollywood's most expensive production, and despite negative coverage of its box office performance, it was a financial success.

  Don 2 came later that year. Khan exercised extensively for the role and performed most of the stunts himself. It was the highest grossing Bollywood production abroad that year and was showcased at the 62nd Berlin International Film Festival. Jab Tak Hai Jaan, in 2012, was Yash Chopra's swan song. At the following Zee Cine Awards, Khan performed a tribute to the late filmmaker with Katrina Kaif, Anushka Sharma, and several of Chopra's other past heroines.

  Chennai Express arrived in 2013 as an action comedy from the director Rohit Shetty. It drew mixed reviews and criticism for its perceived disparagement of South Indian culture, though it included a tribute to the Tamil star Rajinikanth. It still broke many box office records for Hindi films and briefly passed 3 Idiots as the highest grossing Bollywood film of all time. Happy New Year, Farah Khan's ensemble action comedy from 2014, became a major commercial success despite criticism of Khan's one-dimensional character. On International Women's Day in 2013, The Times of India reported that Khan had asked for his lead female co-stars' names to appear above his own in the credits. He said the women in his life were the reason for his success.

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• 6. Setbacks and Comebacks

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  Baadshah, in 1999, was Khan's only release that year. It underperformed at the box office but earned him a Filmfare nomination for Best Performance in a Comic Role. That year he also became a producer, founding the company Dreamz Unlimited with the actress Juhi Chawla and the director Aziz Mirza. Its first production, Phir Bhi Dil Hai Hindustani, came out in 2000 and was a commercial failure. It opened one week after Kaho Naa... Pyaar Hai, and critics believed the newcomer Hrithik Roshan overshadowed Khan. Swapna Mitter of Rediff.com wrote, "Frankly, it's high time he innovated his act a little."

  Ram, also from 2000, was a Kamal Haasan film made simultaneously in Tamil and Hindi. Khan played an archaeologist named Amjad Khan, making his Tamil debut. He worked free of charge because he wanted to work with Haasan.

  In 2001, Dreamz Unlimited tried a comeback with Santosh Sivan's historical epic Aśoka, a partly fictionalised account of the life of the emperor Ashoka. Khan played the title role. The film screened at the Venice Film Festival and the Toronto International Film Festival to a positive response but performed poorly at Indian box offices. As losses mounted, Khan was forced to close srkworld.com, a company he had started alongside Dreamz Unlimited.

  In December 2001, Khan injured his spine performing an action sequence for a special appearance in Krishna Vamsi's Shakti: The Power. Doctors diagnosed a prolapsed disc. He tried multiple alternative therapies, but none gave a permanent solution, and the injury caused severe pain while he shot several films. By the beginning of 2003 his condition had worsened enough to require anterior cervical discectomy and fusion surgery at Wellington Hospital in London. Khan resumed shooting in June 2003 but reduced the number of roles he accepted each year.

  Chalte Chalte, directed by Aziz Mirza, was a success in 2003. Even so, a conflict broke out between Khan and the other Dreamz Unlimited partners over the failure to cast Juhi Chawla in the production. They parted ways. In 2004, Khan transformed the company into Red Chillies Entertainment and added his wife, Gauri, as a producer. Its first production was Main Hoon Na.

  In December 2008, a shoulder injury struck while Khan was filming a small role in Mudassar Aziz's Dulha Mil Gaya. Extensive physiotherapy left the pain so severe that he was almost immobile. He had arthroscopic surgery in February 2009.

  The next slump was about films rather than the body. Dilwale, from 2015, drew mixed reviews, though it was profitable. In Fan, in 2016, Khan played both a superstar and his doppelgänger fan. Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian found it "exhausting, bizarre yet watchable". The film underperformed, and trade journalists blamed its departure from mainstream formula. That year he also played a supporting therapist to Alia Bhatt's aspiring cinematographer in Dear Zindagi.

  In Raees, in 2017, Khan played a bootlegger turned mobster in 1980s Gujarat, and it was a modest success. Jab Harry Met Sejal, also from 2017, cast him as a tourist guide who falls in love with a traveller played by Anushka Sharma. Uday Bhatia of Mint criticised the pairing, since Sharma was 22 years his junior. Zero, in 2018, had Khan playing Bauua Singh, a dwarf caught in a love triangle. Critics praised his energy, yet both Jab Harry Met Sejal and Zero were box office flops.

  A Box Office India report said Khan's stardom had been hurt by his films failing to do well. After Zero, he took a four-year break from full-time acting, partly caused by the COVID-19 pandemic in India. He used the time to attempt a comeback. In 2022 he made extended special appearances in Brahmāstra: Part One - Shiva and Rocketry: The Nambi Effect.

  Pathaan, in 2023, reunited Khan with Yash Raj Films in an action thriller set in the YRF Spy Universe. He played an exiled field agent assigned to stop a terrorist attack in India. Critic Kaveree Bamzai called it a "much-needed makeover" of an ageing Khan into an action star. Pathaan broke several box-office records and re-established his stardom.

  Atlee's Jawan came the same year, with Khan playing father and son doppelgängers. It broke the records that Pathaan had set. The two films rank as Hindi cinema's second and third biggest grossers worldwide, and Khan became the first Indian actor to deliver two films earning over ₹10 billion. For Jawan he received his first National Film Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role, in 2025.

  Dunki, directed by Rajkumar Hirani, was his last release of 2023. The social drama deals with an illegal immigration technique called donkey flight. It was Khan's third consecutive commercial success of the year, although it did not match the record grosses of Pathaan or Jawan.

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• 7. Beyond the Camera

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  Red Chillies Entertainment has divisions for film and television production, visual effects, and advertising. As of 2015, it had produced or co-produced at least nine films. Khan or his wife Gauri usually receive the production credit, and he has appeared in most of the films, either in the lead or in a guest role.

  Ra.One showed how deeply Khan could involve himself in a production. Besides acting, he produced the film, volunteered to write the console game script, and dubbed for it. He oversaw its technical development and wrote digital comics based on its characters.

  He has also sung for his films. In Josh, from 2000, he performed the popular song "Apun Bola Tu Meri Laila". He sang in Don and in Jab Tak Hai Jaan as well. For Always Kabhi Kabhi, a Red Chillies production from 2011, he took part in the lyrical composition.

  In 2009, Khan's company released Billu, in which he played Sahir Khan, a fictionalised version of a Bollywood superstar. The film began as Billu Barber. Hairdressers across the country complained that the word "barber" was derogatory. As head of Red Chillies, Khan made the call to drop it from the title. The company covered the offending word on billboards that had already been installed.

  Television has been another stage. Khan has hosted numerous awards shows, including the Filmfare, Zee Cine, and Screen Awards. In 2007 he replaced Amitabh Bachchan for one season as host of Kaun Banega Crorepati, the Indian version of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? A year later he began hosting Kya Aap Paanchvi Pass Se Tez Hain?, the Indian version of Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?

  Zor Ka Jhatka: Total Wipeout, the Indian version of Wipeout, aired in 2011 on Imagine TV. It lasted one season and became the lowest rated show hosted by a Bollywood star. In 2017 Khan began hosting TED Talks India Nayi Soch, produced by TED Conferences, LLC and broadcast on STAR Plus.

  On stage, Khan's touring began in 1997 with Asha Bhosle's Moments in Time concert in Malaysia. In 1998 he joined The Awesome Foursome world tour across the United Kingdom, Canada, and the United States, with Juhi Chawla, Akshay Kumar, and Kajol. In 2002, the show From India With Love played Manchester's Old Trafford and London's Hyde Park, with Khan, Amitabh Bachchan, Aamir Khan, Preity Zinta, and Aishwarya Rai. More than 100,000 people attended.

  Temptations 2004 toured 22 venues across the world and played to 15,000 spectators at Dubai's Festival City Arena. Khan followed it in 2008 with Temptation Reloaded, which toured several countries including the Netherlands. In 2011 he joined Shahid Kapoor and Priyanka Chopra in the Friendship Concert in Durban, South Africa, celebrating 150 years of India-South Africa friendship. In 2014 he performed in SLAM! The Tour across the US, Canada, and London.

  In 2008, Khan acquired the Kolkata franchise in the Indian Premier League, a Twenty20 cricket tournament, in partnership with Juhi Chawla and her husband Jay Mehta. They named the team Kolkata Knight Riders. The team performed poorly on the field during its first three years. It became champion for the first time in 2012 and repeated the feat in 2014. The Knight Riders hold the record for the longest winning streak by any Indian team in T20s, at 14 matches. They won a third title in the 2024 edition. Khan also co-owns the Trinbago Knight Riders in the Caribbean Premier League.

  In May 2012, the Mumbai Cricket Association banned Khan from Wankhede Stadium for five years after an argument with security staff following a match between Kolkata and the Mumbai Indians. Khan said he acted only after children, including his daughter, were "manhandled" by the guards. He also said he had been abused with a communal comment. Association officials accused him of being drunk in one version of events and of hitting a guard in another. The Wankhede guard later contradicted the claim that Khan had hit him. The association revoked the ban in 2015. In 2016, Mumbai Police concluded that Khan was not drunk and had not used abusive language before minors.

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• 8. Fame, Causes, and Family

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  In 2008, Newsweek named Khan one of the fifty most powerful people in the world and called him "the world's biggest movie star". In 2011, Steven Zeitchik of the Los Angeles Times described him as "the biggest movie star you've never heard of". Anupama Chopra calls him an "ever present celebrity", with two or three films a year, constant television and print advertising, and gigantic billboards lining the streets of Indian cities. In 2022, a readers' poll by Empire magazine listed him among the 50 greatest actors of all time. In 2023, Time magazine named him one of the 100 most influential people in the world, and he topped the readers' poll.

  Forbes India placed Khan at the top of its Celebrity 100 list in 2012, 2013, and 2015. His wealth has been estimated at US$1.4 billion. He owns an apartment in London and a villa on the Palm Jumeirah in Dubai. From 2023 to 2024, he ranked as the highest tax payer in India. Media organisations call him "Brand SRK" because of his many endorsements and ventures. He holds up to a six per cent share of the television advertisement market. His endorsements include Pepsi, Nokia, Hyundai, Dish TV, D'decor, LUX, and TAG Heuer.

  Books and documentaries have followed him. The Inner and Outer World of Shah Rukh Khan appeared in 2005 as a two-part documentary. The Discovery Travel & Living channel aired the ten-part miniseries Living with a Superstar - Shah Rukh Khan in 2010. In 2007 he became the third Indian actor to have a wax statue at Madame Tussauds in London, after Aishwarya Rai and Amitabh Bachchan. Versions of the statue were later installed in Los Angeles, Hong Kong, New York, and Washington. In the Hindi-dubbed Oggy and the Cockroaches, Saurav Chakrabarti imitates Khan's voice for the character Oggy.

  Khan has served as brand ambassador for government campaigns including Pulse Polio and the National AIDS Control Organisation. He sits on the board of directors of the Make-A-Wish Foundation in India. In 2011, UNOPS appointed him the first global ambassador of the Water Supply and Sanitation Collaborative Council. That year he also received UNESCO's Pyramide con Marni award for supporting children's education, becoming the first Indian to win it. He joined India's Health Ministry and UNICEF in a nationwide child immunisation campaign. In 2014 he became ambassador for Interpol's campaign "Turn Back Crime". In 2018 the World Economic Forum gave him its Crystal Award for championing children's and women's rights in India.

  In April 2020, Khan announced initiatives to help the government of India and the state governments of Maharashtra, West Bengal, and Delhi fight the COVID-19 pandemic. He also announced relief for thousands of underprivileged people and daily wage labourers hit by the lockdown. He offered his 4-storey personal office space to the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation for use as a quarantine centre.

  The Government of India awarded him the Padma Shri in 2005. France gave him the Order of Arts and Letters in 2007 and the fifth degree of the Legion of Honour, Chevalier de la Légion d'honneur, in 2014. He has received five honorary doctorates. The first came from the University of Bedfordshire in 2009 and the second from the University of Edinburgh in 2015. The third came from Maulana Azad National Urdu University in 2016, and the latest from The University of Law and La Trobe University in 2019.

  On the 5th of May 2025, Khan attended the Met Gala in Manhattan. He became the first Bollywood male actor to do so, in an outfit designed by Sabyasachi Mukherjee. A month later, in June 2025, he appeared in the music video for Ed Sheeran's song "Sapphire", which also features vocals from Arijit Singh. Earlier, in February 2019, he made a special appearance in "BIBA", a video featuring Marshmello and Shirley Setia.

  On the 25th of October 1991, Khan married Gauri Chibber, a Punjabi Hindu, in a traditional Hindu wedding ceremony, after a six-year courtship. Their son Aryan was born in 1997 and their daughter Suhana in 2000. In 2013 they became parents of a third child, AbRam, born through a surrogate mother. Khan has said that Aryan studied filmmaking at the USC School of Cinematic Arts and co-wrote and directed a Netflix series, The Ba***ds of Bollywood. Suhana studied drama and acting at NYU's Tisch School of the Arts and served as assistant director on Zero. Her acting debut came in November 2019 in a short film, The Grey Part of Blue, followed by the Netflix film The Archies.

  Khan strongly believes in Islam but also values his wife's religion. His children follow both religions, and at home the Qur'an sits next to the murti of Hindu deities. Next, he will star alongside his daughter in Siddharth Anand's action film King, set for release in 2026.

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