Last Updated:December 20, 2025, 20:04 IST

Akshaye Khanna’s father, Vinod Khanna, balanced his booming Bollywood career while living in a tiny four-by-six-foot ashram room, dedicating himself to Osho’s teachings.

Vinod Khanna, lived in a four-foot by six-foot ashram room during the peak of his career.

Akshaye Khanna’s father and veteran actor Vinod Khanna was at the peak of his career when he took a hiatus from Bollywood and joined Osho’s commune in Oregon, but much before he took this step, he was already inclined towards spirituality. It was after a few losses that he found solace in spirituality, revealed his second wife, Kavita.

Kavita, in an interview with Loveena Tandon, revealed, “He was always spiritually inclined. When he was 17 years old, he picked up Autobiography of a Yogi from Strand Bookstore in Bombay, an iconic bookstore, and didn’t put the book down until he finished it. He stayed up all night reading it. Even at the height of his career, whenever J. Krishnamurti (spiritual figure) was in town, if he happened to be shooting, he would take the day off and go attend the lectures.”

While revealing how Khanna’s connection with Osho began, Kavita further revealed, “I think he started listening to Osho’s discourses as they went through a terrible period in their lives, with five deaths in the family, including people who were particularly close to him, like his mother. When his mother died, he went to the ashram and took sanyas. That’s how that journey began.”

“Most people don’t know that for three years, while completing the films he had already signed, which included super hits like Hera Pheri and Qurbani, where he looked his absolute best, he would come and shoot. If the shoot was on location, he’d be there, but his base was Pune. He had a room in the ashram that was just four feet by six feet. Osho even joked about it in his discourses, saying the room was so small that he had to step over the bed and sleep diagonally because there was barely any space. He literally had to step over the bed to enter the room,” she further shared while revealing how Khanna balanced his booming film career with spiritual endeavor and added, “But he did it. In front of the camera, he was doing films; off camera, he was meditating. He was Osho’s gardener in the ashram. Then he went to Oregon.”

Vinod Khanna was a celebrated Indian actor, film producer, and politician. Known for his charismatic screen presence, he starred in iconic Bollywood films like Mere Apne, Amar Akbar Anthony, and Rajput.