On Thursday, Farhan Akhtar took a nostalgic trip to Khairabad, the hometown of his great grandfather, Muztar Khairabadi, and his great grand-uncle, Bismil, both renowned Urdu poets. For the first time, he stepped into his sprawling ancestral home which had belonged to his great great grandfather, Fazle-Haq Khairabadi, a scholar of Islamic studies and theology who had played an important role in the Revolt of 1857. Located 100 km from Lucknow, the small town in Uttar Pradesh used to be a trading centre for the East India Company in the pre-Independence days, known for its market of Kashmiri shawls, Birmingham jewels and elephants from Assam.

“I was keen to learn about my roots and pay my respects to my ancestors. My first and second cousins, with their families, live there now,” Farhan told Mirror from the UP town, adding that his filmmaker-sister, Zoya Akhtar, had pointed out earlier that it was a good day to remember his Parsi roots too. Their mother, Honey Irani, a Zoroastrian, and the siblings wished everybody “Navroze Mubarak” on Thursday too.

The 43-year-old actor-filmmaker is in this part of the country to promote Nikkhil Advani’s upcoming film, Lucknow Central. At Khairabad, he interacted with not just family, but also locals and children for around five hours. Then, he paid homage at the grave of his great grandfather, Muztar Khairabadi’s mother.

The ancestral property is a seven-room bungalow with a garden and backyard shared by four families. “I’ve heard many stories about this place growing up and now, I’d like to know it better. In cities, everything grows rapidly and progresses fast, but in smaller towns like Khairabad, life is slow-paced. I want to put smiles on the faces of these children. I’d like to do for this place what Shabana and Baba Azmi have done for Azamgarh,” Farhan asserted, referring to the work the Mijwan Welfare Society has done for women and child development in Azamgarh using hand-woven chikankari designs as a revenue booster for families.

Interestingly, Farhan’s award-winning lyricist-father, Javed Akhtar, owes his nickname to a line in a poem penned by his father, Jan Nisar Akhtar, when the family was residing in Lucknow. The line goes, ‘Lamha, lamha kisi jadoo ka fasana hoga’, and even today, in Khairabad, he’s known as ‘Jadoo chachu’. Farhan’s time in Khairabad was made “sweeter” with sheermal parathas and meetha paan. The fitness freak has been binging ever since he arrived in Lucknow on Tuesday. “I’m overwhelmed by the love. I’ll definitely be back soon,” he signed off.