Veteran actor Rekha‘s journey into the film industry began under challenging circumstances. Having started working at a young age, she moved to Mumbai with her mother during her teenage years in search of opportunities in cinema. During that period, she crossed paths with actor Sanjay Khan, though their first meeting did not immediately lead to work.Sanjay Khan’s daughter Farah Khan Ali revealed that Rekha recently revisited that memory while visiting the Khan family following the passing of Farah’s mother, Zarine Khan. “My father launched Rekha,” Farah said in an interview with Vickey Lalwani, before recounting what the veteran actor had told her.“Rekha came to the house recently, when my mum died. She was saying that the only reason I am in movies is because of your mother,” Farah recalled. She explained that Sanjay Khan was initially reluctant to pose for a photoshoot with Rekha because he did not consider her conventionally attractive at the time.Sharing Rekha’s own recollection, Farah said, “Rekha said, ‘Because when I first came, I was very plump and I wasn’t very attractive, and your father did not want to do a photo shoot with me. Your mother, Zarine, kept saying, ‘Look at this girl, look at her beautiful eyes and her lovely mouth, please do a photo shoot with her.’ So your father very grudgingly agreed to do the photo shoot with me and when the pictures came, he said, ‘Okay she looks good. We will do the picture’. That’s how I entered the film industry’.”During the same conversation, Farah also spoke about late actor Parveen Babi, saying that her father had introduced her to films as well. She noted that one of Parveen’s early projects was *Trimurti*, which featured Sanjay Khan.When asked whether her family remained in contact with Parveen during her struggles with mental health, Farah replied, “Yes, I was in touch with her, my parents were. I met her a few years before she passed. We were very close because… She was someone I had childhood memories with and she was very loving and very kind. My father is close to Kabir Bedi as well. And Pooja Bedi, of course, is one of my closest friends now.”
