Premium

Akshaye Khanna is the reason women rejected me, recalled Nawazuddin Siddiqui: ‘He had a weird hold on women’

During the press run for their movie Mom, Nawazuddin Siddiqui recited an interesting anecdote from his dating days involving Akshaye Khanna.

3 min readNew DelhiUpdated: Jan 2, 2026 02:56 PM IST

Nawazuddin Siddiqui claimed that girls would reject him for Akshaye Khanna. (Photo: Express Archive)

Be it box office success or the controversy surrounding it, actor Akshaye Khanna is currently the belle of the ball. Following his performance in Aditya Dhar’s film Dhurandhar, he is getting a lot of compliments from within the industry. Speaking of compliments by contemporaries, Khanna received a pretty impressive one from Nawazuddin Siddiqui a few years ago. The Sacred Games actor once claimed during an interview that Khanna was the reason behind him facing rejection from a lot of girls, because they all loved him instead.

While promoting their film Mom, Sridevi, Akhaye, and Nawaz had talked to NDTV. During the interview Nawaz jumped in and shared a story from his time as a bachelor. He said that he faced a lot of rejection during his pursuit for a partner, and a major reason behind it was the fact that all girls were obsessed with Khanna. A modest and silent-looking Khanna can be seen listening to the story patiently, while Sridevi and the audience are laughing.

ALSO READ: Dhurandhar is a ‘well-made film’, says Sudhir Mishra: ‘Aditya Dhar made the audience smell the place’

Nawaz said, “I want to share this one thing with everyone. Before I was married, I was trying very hard to court someone. I would try to talk to girls, but they all used to reject me. So I asked all of them, ‘What kind of a man do you like?’ and I am honestly telling you that all those girls were his (Khanna’s) fans.”

He continued, “I used to ask them, ‘What’s so special about him?’ Someone used to talk about his smile, or someone would start talking about his eyes. He had a weird hold on women, and he had a big fan following.” Akshaye jumped and said, “I had?” Nawaz quickly changed his statement and said that women still love him; it’s just that he does very few films and that he should do more for his fans to watch.

Akshaye laughed away the compliment as Nawaz concluded with, “All of those fans, and everyone else, want Akshaye Khanna to work again. He doesn’t show up a lot, and he is very choosy about his work. Hamari dua hai (it’s our wish) that he does more films.”

Click here to follow Screen Digital on YouTube and stay updated with the latest from the world of cinema.