Ajay Devgn opens up on hardships father Veeru Devgn faced: He ran away at 13 and became gangster

Ajay Devgn, who was seen in the latest episode of ‘Koffee with Karan' Season 8, opened up on the hardships his father has been through.

Ajay revealed that the late action director Veeru Devgn was a member of a street gang. The actor shared that his dad was spotted fighting on the street by a senior action director, who took him under his wing. Asked if his father got the appreciation that he deserved, Ajay said, “Eventually, yes. He ran away from his home in Punjab when he was just 13. He came to Mumbai without a train ticket, was put behind bars, had no work, no food. Somebody helped him out, said that if he washes his cab, my father could sleep in it. He started from there, and eventually became a carpenter, and then a gangster in Sion Koliwada. They had gangs at that time, and gang wars.”

Karan remarked, “Oh, god!”

Ajay added, “One day, a very senior action director, Mr Ravi Khanna, he was passing by, and there was a street fight going on. He stopped the car, and he called my dad after the fight. He said, ‘What do you do?’ My dad said he’s a carpenter, and Mr Khanna said a very nice line; he said, ‘Tu ladta acha hai, come meet me tomorrow’. He made him a fighter.”

Filmmaker Rohit Shetty had a similar story to share. He said that his father came to Mumbai when he was 13-year-old and began working at a restaurant as a waiter; he then started bodybuilding and was hired by a senior action director because of his height.

Ajay further added that people nowadays don’t understand the struggles of past generations to reach till here. He said, ‘it’s not an easy story.’ Karan also revealed that late Yash Johar would have found the nepotism debate laughable, because he knows the struggles, he has gone through to give Karan a bright future. “My father would have laughed if he heard they called me the flagbearer of nepotism. My father had such a tough time to get where he was. He was a production controller, and then he became a producer, and so many of his films failed. I remember my mother selling jewellery, my nani’s apartment…”