I was in an abusive marriage.”
With prime time throwing up personal details of the murder of Ketan Agarwal in Maharashtra, allegedly by his unremorseful fiancée Siya Goyal in collusion with her boyfriend Chetan, the focus has shifted from cases like the Twisha Sharma “suicide/murder” where a woman is always the victim.
Men too can be victims. The thought emerged from a casual conversation at the 25th year celebrations of AKP, Aamir Khan’s production house. From Lagaan (2001), Taare Zameen Par (2007) and Dangal (2016) to Batwara 1947 (due for release next month), every AKP film, hit or flop, got its moment on stage. Among the team players heartily applauded was nephew Imran Khan who was launched with AKP’s Jaane Tu…Ya Jaane Na (2008) followed by Delhi Belly (2011).
Partner Lekha Washington by his side, Imran looked natty and cheery, far from how you’d imagine an actor to be, after being missing from action for 10 years. Imran’s last mainstream film was Katti Batti with Kangana, the cherry on top of a heap of flops. Compounded by a disastrous marriage and a string of recent interviews where the conversation centred on mental health and healing, he hardly seemed the poster boy of wellbeing.
But the suited-booted Imran that evening didn’t wear the stress of failure — professional, personal or emotional — anywhere on his being.
That’s when he came out with the single sentence about an abusive marriage. There’d been hints of it in his Instagram posts. One post had read, “I support women’s rights and their wrongs.” But he’s airing it now. From the time of his wedding to Avantika Malik in 2011 right until 2015 when he went off the social radar, there’d been no tell-tale marks of trauma.
“It’s like a woman in a physically violent relationship,” he countered. “What does she do? She wears makeup, hides the abuse and puts up an all’s-well front before the world. Men going through trauma are much the same.”
The one question that many would ask any Ketan Agarwal who loses his life or any Imran who was losing his balance, didn’t you see the red flags? Especially when they’d had a live-in relationship before marriage?
The answer is complex. Both Imran and Avantika were in their teens when they got together. In the grip of whatever the dynamics between them, it was tough to break free.
There’s also a passing thought that with Avantika and Imran being the products of broken marriages, they wouldn’t have wanted to put daughter Imara through what they had experienced. Avantika was nine when her parents divorced, Imran was barely two when his mom and dad split. But not all divorces come with toxicity, some are handled with elegance. To this day, when dad Anil Pal visits Mumbai, he stays with Imran and mom Nuzhat. “And when mom, Imara and I go to the US, we stay with him.”
Imran also spent his high school years with his father in California, so he didn’t grow up gripped by a missing dad syndrome. A successful Silicon Valley tech man who was devoted to caring for his father with Alzheimer’s, Anil Pal currently takes it easy, teaching sailing.
Similarly, in Mumbai too, Imran grew up surrounded by uncles Aamir and Mansoor Khan, strong, individualistic men who march to their own beat. Aamir is in his third marriage and juggles with a variety of creative ideas, Mansoor prefers organic farming and the hills of Coonoor to the glitz of cinema.
Try looking at the world around Imran inhabited by a potpourri of human dynamics. He grew up watching them up close and experiencing some of them himself. They are bound to come out in some form. For Imran, it is cinema.
Teaming up with director Danish Aslam, Imran is determined to return to cinema that excites him. Together, they’ve made Adhure Hum Adhure Tum for Netflix with Bhumi Pednekar partnering Imran.
You don’t need a counsellor to prescribe catharsis as the best form of healing.
Bharathi S. Pradhan is a senior journalist and an author