Aamir Khan breaks silence on son Junaid Khan’s dyslexia: 'Taare Zameen Par hit me hard because...'

Aamir Khan, Mr Perfectionist and Bollywood megastar recently spoke about his son and actor Junaid Khan’s dyslexia for the first time at a recent Taare Zameen Par fan meet. The Sitaare Zameen Par star mentioned that he is comfortable discussing it as his son has already made it public.

Aamir revealed that Taare Zameen Par connected him deeply as it showed his own experience. The actor shared that he didn’t understand Junaid ’s struggles with reading and writing initially but supported him when he came to know about his condition.

“I’ve never spoken about this until today. Maybe this is the first time I’m saying it. And the reason is that many years have passed. And secondly, the person I’m going to talk about has already spoken about this publicly. So now I can talk about it openly. I’m talking about Junaid – my son Junaid. It’s been 17–18 years since that film was released, and I’ve never said this until now: Junaid is dyslexic. So when I first heard the story (of Taare Zameen Par), it hit me so hard – because I’ve been through it myself. I was like Nandkishore Awasthi in the beginning (the father from Taare Zameen Par). I used to scold Junaid," said Aamir Khan.

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The actor further revealed that Junaid’s writing was really bad as a child. “So I would tell him, ‘Junaid, how can someone write so badly? No one can even read this. What is it? You can’t even write an A? What’s going on?’ I genuinely used to ask him. And when he used to read, he would say ‘from’ instead of ‘for’. Whenever he saw an ‘F’, he would just guess the word- of, from, for. He couldn’t read properly. So I used to try to explain things to him, and I would get confused too — how can he not understand such simple things? Then later on, we found out he has dyslexia. And of course, we helped him with that. But when I heard the story, it felt like my story. It was so close to me."

In January, the Loveyapa actor revealed how his parents, Aamir Khan and Reena Dutta, realised that he has dyslexia. The actor further shared that his parents realised that the child in the story was having similar experiences as Junaid while reading Taare Zameen Par’s script. “Neither of my parents were particular (about my results)… I was also diagnosed with dyslexia very early on. So, I think they were mindful of that especially in schooling," said Junaid while talking to Vickey Lalwani.