Bollywood superstar Aamir Khan denied that his character in “3 Idiots” was based on educator and climate activist Sonam Wangchuk, addressing the long-running rumor during a BFI In Conversation event at BFI Southbank, held as part of the London Indian Film Festival, which separately marked the 25th anniversary of “Lagaan.”

“No, that’s not true, actually. No, no. It’s a misconception,” Khan said.

The question arose after “3 Idiots” co-star Omi Vaidya, who played Chatur in the film, shared a video on social media linking Khan’s character Phunsukh Wangdu to Wangchuk and drawing attention to Wangchuk’s deteriorating health during a hunger strike protesting the resignation of India’s education minister.

“I know I saw a video of Chatur recently. He said yes. No, he is wrong,” Khan said. “Maybe that was what Chatur was thinking, but I want to tell you that not even Raju [director Rajkumar Hirani] nor abhijat [writer Joshi] It was the two writers, not me. We didn’t know anything about Mr. Sonam. However, what Sonam sir is doing is a good job. In any case, he doesn’t have to be based on the ‘3 Idiots’ character for us to respect him and the work he does.”

When asked about Wangchuk’s hunger strike, Khan said: “I think we are all very worried about his health and we hope he ends well. We all hope he ends his fast.”

“Lagaan” was released in 2001 and was nominated for an Oscar. Asked if he anticipated talking about “Lagaan” on a London stage a quarter of a century later, Khan said no. “We were just scared. I was terrified trying to get it right,” he said of the production. Later in the conversation, he described the film as “a film about the triumph of the human spirit.”

Khan grew up in a family of filmmakers; his father and uncle were filmmakers. When asked about his early interest in acting, he said, “My parents and everyone in my family were totally against it.”

Khan reached the level of state tennis champion as a junior player before leaving the sport. Recalling an exhibition match with Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic, he said: “I have the distinction of having Federer and Djokovic sitting on either side of the net, trying to get it down… I’m the only person who has that privilege.”

Khan’s first exposure to a film set came around the age of seven or eight, during “Yaadon Ki Baaraat”. She recalled that the pancake makeup applied to her face “smelled horrible.” Of the set itself, he said: “It’s very scary. It was very dark and there was a lot of noise and people were screaming and shouting.”

Khan mentioned “Holi,” Ketan Mehta’s 1984 film, as a turning point. “I wanted to be a part of the movie just to see what a Steadicam is and how it works,” he said, noting that the equipment never arrived and that the movie was shot in handheld mode.

When asked about the perception of a golden era of Hindi cinema in the 1980s and 1990s, Khan pointed further back. “For me, the golden age of Indian cinema is the 1950s and 1960s,” he said, citing the writers, composers and filmmakers of that period, and describing, in contrast, the 1980s as the nadir of commercial cinema before a wave of younger directors began to revive it.

Discussing his choice of leading roles, including Deepa Mehta’s “Earth 1947,” Khan said, “I was constantly swimming against the current.”

Khan said he was in the midst of a series of box office flops when director Mahesh Bhatt offered him a film. He rejected it because he didn’t like the script. “If I had made concessions that day, man, I think my whole career would have been a series of concessions,” he said. “When I was able to stick to what I believed in in my worst moments, it gave me a lot of strength.” He said the experience taught him to weigh three factors before signing on to any project in the future: the strength of the script, complete trust in the director and a producer willing to provide adequate resources to the creative team.

When asked about the years after “Lagaan” and “Dil Chahta Hai”, both released in 2001, Khan said: “I was also going through a personal crisis. I was going through my divorce from Reena, so I was not emotionally in a position to work.”

He returned with Mehta’s “Mangal Pandey”. Talking about his research process for “Mangal Pandey”, Khan said, “There is very little written about Mangal Pandey.” He noted that London’s India House museum has only a few pages on the 19th-century soldier and revolutionary.

When asked about directing child actors in “Taare Zameen Par”, his directorial debut, Khan said: “I have to say directing the kids was the easiest. I didn’t have to tell them anything. They were so natural and they just got it.”

When asked about the string of hits that followed, including “Ghajini,” “3 Idiots,” “Dhoom 3,” “PK” and “Dangal,” Khan said, “I was really fortunate to have some great stories coming,” adding that he had no way of predicting which of the films would connect with audiences before its release.

Khan pointed to the smartphone as the dividing line in how audiences watch movies, contrasting today’s viewers with what he called a “captive audience” of previous decades. “I’m competing with a thousand other things,” he said, adding that storytelling remains the constant that determines whether a film connects, regardless of the format.

When asked about his process, Khan said, “My first step is to try to get into the head of the character. Once I’m clear about that, everything else comes from there: my appearance, my behavior, the language, all of that comes from that.”

Khan’s next film is an Indo-Australian project. Aamir Khan Productions, Mind Blowing Films and Kabir Khan Films have unveiled “Silkyara 41,” a feature film inspired by the 2023 rescue mission at the Silkyara Tunnel in Uttarakhand, India. The film is written by Australian screenwriter Andrew Anastasios (“The Water Diviner”) and directed by Kabir Khan (“Bajrangi Bhaijaan,” “’83′”), and focuses on the role played by tunnel expert Arnold Dix in the operation. Preparation begins August 1 and the film begins principal photography in November.