Kiran Rao Says She And Aamir Khan Began Dating During 'Mangal Pandey' Shoot: 'I Reconnected With Him'

Kiran Rao, who is currently enjoying the success of her recent film ‘Laapataa Ladies’, has opened up about how she met her ex-husband, actor Aamir Khan, and began dating him. The filmmaker also recalled she wrote her debut movie ‘Dhobi Ghat’ while being with Aamir on the sets of ‘Rang De Basanti’.

In an interview with Cyrus Says, Kiran recalled how a call from Reema Kagti helped her bag her first ever project with Aamir Khan. Kiran said, “I was in between jobs when Reema Kagti called me and said there is this happening in Bhuj, do you wan to come? And I was like okay. She was like ‘It’s good, it’s for three months.’ We did for six months. It was a film called Lagaan. Back then, I hadn’t seen a lot of Hindi movies. I didn’t have a reference point to know how different it was in some ways. Aamir was taking a huge risk making this sports film, backing 100 years ago in Awadhi, a different dialect altogether. When I was in-charge of getting all of them into layers and layers of their outfits, it was quite an experience. It was like a film school for me.”

Kiran continued, “The film shoot started really cold, it started in January and it went on until June. So, when it was May, we would shoot until say 11 am max and then we wouldn’t shoot for 4-5 hours and then start again at 4 or 5 pm. Because it was based on cricket, the three month shoot became six months. That year was quite eventful, I did Lagaan and then Monsoon Wedding. Then Reema and Zoya were doing Dil Chahta Hai so they sent me to Goa for extra casting.”

Kiran further revealed that she “reconnected” with Aamir when he was shooting for ‘Mangal Pandey’ and they hit it off instantly. “When I was working on Swades, I reconnected with Aamir. During that time, he was shooting for Mangal Pandey. That’s when we started dating. After Swades was over, Aamir had started Rang De Basanti. And when he was shooting for Rang De Basanti, because he was travelling for two-three months, I thought let me just travel with him and write. I actually wrote my film Dhobi Ghat when Aamir was shooting for his film.”

She added, “I had not written a screenplay before and honestly I had never even made a short film except for when I was studying in Jamia. I narrated it to Aamir, who was terrified that he would hate it.”

Kiran Rao tied the knot with Aamir Khan in 2005. The duo, who shares a son together, are now divorced.