SRK, Aamir, Salman: Who Is The Best Khan Afterall?

Let us start with a little background saga on the three most popular Khans of Bollywood.

Shah Rukh Khan: This unswerving – mouthed star made his way into Bollywood sans any industry connect. His theater experiences and training with Barry John and later the hugely popular television show: Fauji alongside Aziz Mirza’s Circus, Dil Dariya and In Which Annie Gives It Those Ones landed him with his first acting debut (film) which is also his first lead actor debut (film), Deewana.

Aamir Khan: His film debut was at the age of 8, Nasir Hussain’s Yaadon Ki Baraat. His adult acting debut was in Holi, a 1984 Ketan Mehta film, that did not turn out well at the Box Office.

Salman Khan: His acting debut happened with Biwi Ho To Aisi  a 1988 film. He did not take any known training for acting before joining the industry.

As a lead, Aamir debuted opposite Juhi Chawla in a much loved 1988 movie, Qayamat Se Qayamat Tak. But the actor was not a perfectionist right from the very beginning. In fact, it will fit to say, that perfection comes with experience. In the earlier stages of his career as a lead actor, he randomly signed many movies that neither is remembered for its performances, nor for its box office miracles. However, Dil, opposite Madhuri Dixit, saw a much more mature Aamir. Dil went ahead and became the movie with the highest grossing for the year 1990. The last Aamir Khan movie, opposite Rani Mukerji and Kareena Kapoor, Talaash, had box office earnings worth $ 1638706 as accounted for by 30 Nov 2012.

But a little before the Dil event happened to the Hindi Film Industry Scenario, Salman Khan’s 1989 project, Maine Pyaar Kiya, opposite Bhagyashree came and conquered and is still considered a Rajashri Productions miracle. His latest film opposite Sonakshi Sinha, Dabangg 2 earned $ 1019213 in its opening weekend as per December 21, 2012.

At a time when there was no single star ruling the Bollywood estate, three very close interventions occurred. The third and relatively newer one being Shah Rukh Khan with the 1992 release Deewana. Unlike the previous two, Shah Rukh instantly smoothened his path by the two critically acclaimed consequent 1993 films, Baazigar and Darr. His last venture, Jab Tak Hai Jaan, opposite Katrina Kaif and Anushka Sharma, saw box office earnings of $ 1283585 as on Nov 16, 2012.

It won’t be easy to provide career sketches of these actors as they’ll be hugely crowded with many movies, mostly liked, some disliked, some hits and some flops. What is interesting is that, if we see a trend of similarity between the three larger than life Khans, we’ll notice that end 1980s and start 1990s have been the most crucial junctures of their acting career where they began to make a mark.

And all these years later, they have mostly tried to use the Indian Festive Season beginning with Eid, continuing through Diwali and shimmering down to Christmas, as the apt time for the release of their ventures. Differentially speaking, where as Aamir and Salman, both began with leads as the ultimate end – 1900s screen hero who loves and fights for love in their debut films, Shah Rukh experimented with a socially relevant drama opposite Divya Bharti. Today, while Dabangg 2 dealt with a married rogue cop’s surreal attempts at setting things right from wrong, Talaash is about a cop’s family complexities and supernatural revenge, all set in a socially tabooed locality. Shah Rukh Khan, however, took it a step ahead to showcase a love story (and they claimed it was a timeless one) fraught with varied complexities, a word to God, a documentary and all this in the life of a street-singer turned bomb diffuser to the Indian army. It can be easily noticed how with time screenplays have become relatively more complex as far as main stream movies are concerned.

Rumour is that the stars are so tired of media comparing them against each other that recently Aamir Khan and Shah Rukh Khan had to quit, or at least take a break, from a popular social networking site. Now now, to enjoy fame, stars will have to endure some invasion of privacy!

Do comment to let us know, who according to you is the best Khan, after all!