Actor Soni Razdan recently shared how her kids Alia Bhatt and Shaheen Bhatt had a middle-class upbringing as there was never excess money.
In a chat with Rashmi Uchil for her book Raising Stars, Soni recalled an incident when she was travelling to Dubai with her daughters and since they could not afford 3 business class tickets, she made them travel in economy.
‘Once, we were travelling to Dubai and could not afford three business-class tickets. I told my children, ‘I will travel first class, and you guys travel economy.’ They made a face. When I went to check on them, I saw the lady in the seat right in front of them had reclined her seat, and these children had hardly any space in front of them. I told my children, ‘Why don’t you ask her to straighten her seat? Are you guys okay?’ They were miffed and retorted, ‘Why are you asking us how we are doing? We will not tell her anything.’ The lady in front of them was a senior citizen and they felt bad telling her to straighten her seat. It wasn’t a big deal at all,’ she shared.
Sharing her point of view behind getting her kids to travel economy, Soni said that her logic was that once you can afford the business class fare, you could travel in business class.
‘My logic was you have not earned enough to travel in business class as yet. Once you earn enough to afford the business class fare, please travel in business class. Simple as that,’ she said.
Soni Razdan shared that her family ‘never had plenty, but we managed fine,’ and that her two children had ‘a normal, regular middle-class upbringing.’ She mentioned that there was never any excess money, and they lived in a two-bedroom apartment until 2004.
According to Soni, ‘money started coming in’ only after Mahesh turned producer, but even then, he had two households to look after. Mahesh Bhatt was previously married to Kiran Bhatt, with whom he has two children – Pooja Bhatt and Rahul Bhatt.
During that time, Soni Razdan had a Maruti Zen and would personally drive her kids to school in that car. She expressed that she was glad her children had a typical middle-class upbringing because that was how she was raised as well. Soni mentioned that while her husband had a car and a driver to take him to work, she had a Zen and would drive the children to school herself, also picking them up afterward.