Shabana Azmi opens up on dealing with Javed Akhtar's alcoholism: 'He knew that...'

The legendary lyricist and screenwriter Javed Akhtar has mentioned multiple times in his interviews that at one point in his life, he was turning into an alcoholic and would drink one bottle daily. But, he quit drinking after realising that he won't be able to live long if he continued the same way. Now, in a recent interview, his wife and actress Shabana Azmi has shared how she dealt with Javed Akhtar's alcoholism.

Calling that phase "difficult", the multiple National Award-winning actress told Arbaaz Khan on his chat show The Invincibles, "He knew that if I go on like this, I won’t live for long and I won’t be able to do my work creatively." She also recalled the day when Javed Akhtar decided to quit drinking suddenly.

"We were in a flat in London. He was stinking of alcohol and I said 'Oh my god, this is going to be one of those trips'. Very quietly he told me ‘Make me some breakfast'. He had breakfast and after that he told me, 'I am not going to drink anymore’. I didn’t say anything. I just said 'Means?' He said 'I am not going to drink anymore'. He had never said this before and from that day, he has not touched (alcohol)", Shabana added.

In an interview with Mojo Story earlier this year, Javed Akhtar had talked about his addiction with alcohol when he had said, "I started drinking at the age of 20-21 and left when I was 42 years old. I could afford a bottle and used to drink almost a bottle every night. It’s very common for Urdu poetics to become big drunkards because they believe that if they are poets and artistes, they should be carefree and you should drink. I think I had those wrong values." He had also shared that his alcoholism was also one of the reasons why his first marriage with Honey Irani failed. 

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