KING KHAN GETS HIS DUE

The long overdue honour for SRK, one of India's most popular movie actors with a fan following that straddles the globe, has come after several snubs and near-misses in the past. He has won the award this year for a double role in Atlee's Jawan, one of the highest grossing films ever in the history of Indian cinema

- Saibal Chatterjee

MUMBAI: India's National Film Awards have lost their sheen in recent years but when Shah Rukh Khan, often called the Badshah of Bollywood, is adjudged the best actor by a jury presided over by his Swades director Ashutosh Gowariker, can his fans stay calm? Not a chance in hell because the recognition has not come a day too soon.

The long overdue honour for SRK, one of India's most popular movie actors with a fan following that straddles the globe, has come after several snubs and near-misses in the past. He has won the award this year for a double role in Atlee's Jawan, one of the highest grossing films ever in the history of Indian cinema.

The film cast him as a lookalike pair of father and son who take on a world where evil is rife. The principal role was that of Azad, a women's prison jailer who becomes a vigilante against corruption and assembles a team of inmates to wage war on those responsible for duping the nation.

The same year saw Shah Rukh Khan make a comeback (after a long hiatus) to the big screen with Pathaan, a high-voltage espionage thriller that, like Jawan, vindicated that he is still a box-office dynamite. The super-success of Pathaan and Jawan, both of which saw the actor don the persona of an action-hero, ended a lull in his career. Films like Fan (2016), Jab Harry Met Sejal (2017) and Zero (2018) underperformed. Shah Rukh took a break before returning with a massive bang.