Javed Akhtar reveals how Salim-Javed became partners, was paid Rs 50 for his first film as a writer

Javed Akhtar said, “We never decided that we will now start working together. We never consciously decided that now we’ll work together, it just grew. It just happened. Incidentally the first job I got, I was paid Rs 50 for that. I then jumped to Rs 100 as my fee for Sarhadi Lutera (1966). It turned out to be one of the most important films in my career because that’s where I met Salim sahab. He was the romantic lead in that film and I was writing dialogues for it. The director and the producer on the film troubled me a lot during that time but it was Salim sahab who continuously motivated me to write. He said if you can write so well for a film like this, you’d write so much better for better films.”

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He continued, “After that I shifted to Bandra and started living with a friend. He used to pay the rent, I used to live with him. That’s also when I started frequenting Salim sahab’s house because at least one meal was fixed for me. We used to sit and write stories. Around that time, S. M. Sagar sahab, who made Sarhadi Lutera and who introduced us, told us that there was a shift story and asked us to write a screenplay for that. So we agreed and asked him how much he’d pay us for it. He said he’d pay us Rs 5000 for it. I skipped a heartbeat hearing that. We both wrote the screenplay for that. We did ghostwriting for it.”

Javed Akhtar then shared how he and Salim Khan got their first official break because of Rajesh Khanna.

He said, “We met a gentleman who asked us to go to Sippy Films because he was aware of our work. We were not sure of going because we didn’t know how they’d respond. But then one afternoon, we didn’t have much to do and decided to go to Sippy Films anyway. There we met Rajesh Khanna and he asked us to write the screenplay of Haathi Mere Saathi. So there was not a specific day when we decided that today we’ll start working together, to become partners. We just grew. It happened like that. Then you all know, the rest is history.”

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Angry Young Men, the docu-series based on the life of Salim Khan and Javed Akhtar, will drop on Amazon Prime Video on August 20.