Javed Akhtar opened up about his failed marriage with his first wife, Honey Irani. The writer-lyricist took ’60 to 70 percent’ responsibility of his failed marriage. He added that if he had as much understanding of life as he did today when he was younger, things would have been different. While Javed poured his heart out during a conversation in the new docu-series Angry Young Men, Shabana Azmi lauded Honey for her reaction to the split.
Speaking in the Amazon Prime Video series, Javed said, “Honey is one person in the world towards whom I feel guilty. And she’s the only person. About 60 to 70 person responsibility lies on my shoulder for the failure of that marriage. If I had as much understanding as I have today, perhaps, things would not have gone wrong. It’s very difficult to accept. But that’s how it is.”
Javed and Honey fell in love with Honey on the sets of Seeta Aur Geeta. Honey played Hema Malini’s cousin in the film. They got married in 1972. However, Javed and Honey got divorced in 1985. Javed got married to Shabana Azmi soon after. He co-parented Farhan Akhtar and Zoya Akhtar with Honey. In the series, Farhan confessed he was angry with his father after witnessing the turn of events.
“There was a phase when I was angry with him. I felt betrayed by him. There was all those very normal emotions that I did go through as a child growing up,” Farhan said. Zoya added, “After the split happened, we ended living with our mother, we ended up spending more time with our mother. But yeah, it took time to go back to normal with my dad. I think Shabana played a big part in creating that normalcy.”
Despite the divorce, Shabana said, Honey did not feed ill thoughts about Javed or Shabana into the kids. “In any relationship, which is a triangular relationship, it is very personal and very painful, especially when children are involved. It becomes more hurtful because people are so quick to pass judgement and say ‘she’s a home-breaker’, ‘she’s a home-destroyer’ and things like that,” she said.
Shabana admitted she was tempted to explain herself but refrained from it. “Obviously I wanted to explain my point of view but then I figured if I did that, I would end up hurting far too many people. So wisdom lay in keeping quiet and not explaining myself and getting the brickbats which obviously I would get. And I give huge credit to Honey because she could have easily filled the children with tales against me. She just didn’t do that. She gave them the security that you do not have to consider her an evil stepmother. She and I have a very warm and really nice relationship,” she said.
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