I recently watched the hindi film ‘Jolly LLB 3’ on Netflix here in London, and what struck me the most was Akshay Kumar’s honesty in standing firmly with India’s farmers, the very ‘annadata’ who feed us. Given that he is often perceived as close to the Narendra Modi government, his willingness to lend his powerful voice to the farmers’ cause felt rooted in conviction, not convenience. He didn’t sound anti-development, nor was he attacking the establishment. He simply tried to expose the hypocrisy of the privileged, who would never give up their own bungalows in the name of progress while expecting farmers to surrender their land and hearth for infrastructure projects. It made me wonder: How is it that a star with this kind of moral credibility, range and cultural weight, a man who can shape national conversations, has still not become a global brand like Shah Rukh Khan?
At best, Akshay is an ideology-agnostic artist who speaks truth as he sees it, perhaps because he comes from the soil himself. It’s a cold morning but it’s Sunday, so London is quieter. I am writing this piece with a Lavazza cappuccino in hand, tucked into my usual corner at a café in London. The owner is English, the waitresses Kurdish, and the customers a mosaic of African, European and Middle Eastern faces. I know some of them because they live in my building. Between sips, I run a small survey, a casual experiment of sorts. “Do you watch Bollywood?” I ask them. A few say yes. “Between Shah Rukh Khan, Akshay Kumar and Hrithik Roshan, who do you know?” SRK wins by a landslide. One girl says she has heard about Hrithik. No one recognises Akshay Kumar. Only blank faces. I show them a clip on my phone. “Oh yes, yes,” one woman says. “I’ve seen him. What’s his name again?” And there lies the contradiction.
One of India’s most bankable stars, a man whose films have carried emotion, conscience and mass appeal for over three decades, barely registers outside India or the diaspora. Shah Rukh Khan is a global shorthand for Bollywood; Priyanka Chopra has crossed industries and continents. But Akshay Kumar, though adored at home, remains strangely invisible abroad. This saddens an ardent AK fans like me.
I remember interviewing SRK years ago, at a time when he seemed to endorse every product under the sun. I asked if he was overdoing it, if he wasn’t afraid of overexposure. He grinned, his famous dimpled grin, and with his characteristic mix of charm and arrogance said, “SRK sells. Period.” And he does. Once, I toured four countries with a nominal Indian population to gauge Bollywood’s reach beyond the diaspora. To my surprise, from Uzbekistan to Germany, from Spain to Morocco, Shah Rukh Khan was the most popular Indian star. In Hannover, I met the German editor of a showbiz magazine called Ishq (dedicated entirely to Bollywood news in German language). She told me that Khan became well-known in Germany around 2004, when a private channel began airing his movies on demand every Sunday. The moment he realised his growing popularity, he got himself invited to the Berlin Film Festival. “SRK knows how to sell, not just films, but feelings,” she said. He is a global brand because he speaks the language of international stardom – articulate, witty, charming and humble but always ensuring self-promotion.
Akshay Kumar, on the other hand, has perhaps never consistently tried to promote himself outside India. He sells sincerity instead and maybe that’s why the world hasn’t yet fully bought in. There are few Indian films that have carried both heart and heft with such honesty as ‘Pad Man’ and ‘Airlift’. In my view, they weren’t just hits, they were statements – proof that Akshay could make the ordinary heroic and the heroic human. ‘Pad Man’ told a story about dignity and invention, ‘Airlift’ about courage and compassion. Both were deeply Indian, yet universal in emotion. But beyond India’s borders, their impact faded too quickly, if at all. That is sad. Because Akshay Kumar has nothing left to prove in India.
For over three decades and over 150 films, he has fought, laughed, flown and philosophised his way through cinema. From the high-octane ‘Khiladi’ era to the self-effacing brilliance of ‘Hera Pheri’, from the nationalism of ‘Baby’ and ‘Airlift’ to the social conscience of ‘Toilet: Ek Prem Katha’ and the ‘Jolly LLB’ series, he’s done it all. His filmography isn’t a resume. It is a mini film industry in itself.
Yet, for all his versatility and endurance, Akshay’s stardom remains curiously contained within India’s borders. Shah Rukh Khan conquered continents; Priyanka Chopra crossed industries and parked herself self-assuredly in Hollywood. Akshay, in contrast, remains India’s most beloved domestic product – famous everywhere Indians live, but still waiting to be discovered where they don’t.
His own story, though, is very filmy, a truly rags to riches story. Born Rajiv Hari Om Bhatia in Amritsar in 1967, raised in Delhi’s crowded Chandani Chowk bylanes, he wasn’t destined for glamour. His early life was a story of grit and migration. He came from a family of modest means. He was raised in an atmosphere where even dreaming big was luxury. It is reported that Akshay left for Bangkok to learn martial arts, washing dishes and waiting tables to pay for classes. Later, in Hong Kong, he studied discipline before he ever tasted success.
That sense of structure – the belief that consistency can outlast chaos – became the spine of his life and career. The story goes that a student once suggested he try modelling. He did, reluctantly. The camera liked him. Soon came the small roles, the rejections, the photo shoots, the first film. ‘Saugandh’ (1991) was the start, ‘Khiladi’ (1992) was the explosion. Suddenly, he was India’s action hero. He became a lean, fearless figure leaping off buildings and landing into the nation’s imagination. “I do my own stunts,” he said once, not once many times, “because I trust my body more than the wires.” That line tells you everything about the man.
(Syed Zubair Ahmed is a
London-based journalist)
