Sharmila Tagore and Tiger Pataudi’s 43-year marriage survived even though ‘monogamous, long-term relationship is challenging’, says daughter Soha Ali Khan

Sharmila Tagore was just 24 when she married cricketer Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi, who came from a royal family. The couple faced some opposition from the society as they came from different faiths, but despite the differences in their upbringing, they managed to stay together for 43 years, until Mansoor’s death in 2011. Both Sharmila and Mansoor had very demanding careers, and in a recent interview, their daughter Soha Ali Khan, said that staying in a “monogamous, long term relationship,” is quite demanding but her parents made it. She also shared the golden advice her mother gave her to make relationships work.

In a chat with Radio Nasha Official, Soha said that her mother often tells her to stay in touch with the extended family, because people are starting to lose touch with their relatives in modern society. She then spoke about the best relationship advice that her mother has shared with her. “She managed to stay in a marriage till my father passed away and I think being in a monogamous, long-term relationship is very challenging, especially today. There’s a lot of options,” she said.

Soha shared that Sharmila’s advice was not woke but to her, it made sense, even though it presumes that all men and women have assigned personality traits. “I feel like her advice in terms of, ‘Don’t offend a man’s ego and don’t offend a woman’s emotions’, may not be the most woke advice, but I think it works,” she said.

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Sharmila and Mansoor got married in 1968 when she was a popular movie star and he was playing cricket for the Indian national team. Unlike the female actors of her generation, Sharmila continued to work in the movies even after she got married and had her three children. In fact, she was the primary breadwinner of the house as cricketers were not paid much back in the day.

Sharmila embraced Islam when she married Mansoor and changed her name to Ayesha. In an earlier chat with Simi Garewal, she spoke about changing her faith and said, “It wasn’t easy nor was it very difficult. It had to be faced and understood. You couldn’t be very flippant about it. Before that, I wasn’t terribly religious. Now, I think I know more about Hinduism and Islam.”