Shah Rukh Khan cracked IIT entrance exam, never pursued engineering: ‘My mom said show it to me and I did’

Shah Rukh Khan was the model student at his school and many of his peers have often said that he had the passion and the charisma to excel in life. While it is well known that SRK studied Economics from Delhi University, and later went on to study Mass Communication from Jamia Millia Islamia, he actually cracked the entrance exam for IIT before he joined Delhi University.

In an interview recorded in the year 2000, SRK shared with Karan Thapar on BBC that he studied science in school but wanted to pursue a different subject in college. When he shared the same with his mother, who wanted him to continue studying science she asked him to take the IIT exam, which he did and passed it as well. He shared, “When I was choosing my career, my mom said, ‘I would like you to go into sciences’. I said, ‘Okay, I can take an exam but I would like to do economics because I had finished my sciences from school’. She said, ‘Oh, you want to shift over to economics but can you do the IIT entrance? Can you do this engineering entrance?’’ I said, ‘I can’ and she said, ‘Okay, just show it to me’. So I did it and I passed it. And then she said, ‘You don’t need to take it, you now go and do your economics’.”

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In the same chat Shah Rukh shared that he grew up in a “liberal” household and was encouraged to practice his religion in a way that he felt like doing it. Talking about his childhood, Shah Rukh said, “It was nice and easy and it was… with a lot of freedom. I have an elder sister too. We were never told what to do, what not to do. Very liberal family. As a matter of fact, even in religious teachings, functions, studies, career everything was… you just do it the way you want and just be happy about it and do your best.”

He also spoke about practicing Islam and reading namaz during his formative years and said, “I was told that it’s nice to go and read the namaz so I would go and do it, and the way it was told, you felt like doing it. All my life, I wish I could bring up my children like that, where you are made to respect it without being scared of anything that is told to you by your parents.”