Sohail Khan and Seema Khan were spotted at the Family Court in Mumbai yesterday. As per reports, the two filed for divorce after 24 years of marriage. The couple is yet to release an official statement, however, they have been living separately for some time now. Sohail and Seema got married in 1998. They have two sons Nirvan (20) and Yohan (11).

Sohail who began his career as a director with Auzaar, also acted in a number of films, while Seema, who is a fashion designer, was recently seen in an OTT show.

Talking about her relationship with Sohail, on the show, Seema had said, “Sohail and I are not in a conventional marriage but we are a family. We are a unit. For us, him and me and our children matter at the end of the day. ”

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After BMC officials confirmed actors Kareena Kapoor Khan and Amrita Arora tested positive for Covid-19 and that they flouted norms by attending parties, Khan’s spokesperson told IndiaToday.in they contracted the virus at a private dinner. “Among that group, there was one person who seemed unwell. This person should have been responsible enough to not attend the dinner and put others at risk…It is not fair to put the blame on Kareena,” said the spokesperson. Her father, Randhir Kapoor, shared her health update, saying she had fever and body ache. Khan is currently on home quarantine. Meanwhile, actor Sanjay Kapoor’s wife, Maheep Kapoor, and actor Sohail Khan’s wife, Seema Khan, have also tested Covid-19 positive.

She never wanted to join films, even though she married into a family where almost everyone is associated with the film industry. Fashion designer Seema Khan found herself in the limelight when she starred in the recently released OTT show, Fabulous Lives of Bollywood Wives.

Wife of actor Sohail Khan, she emphasises that she’s a very “private person”, but her problem wasn’t that she wouldn’t open up in front of the camera. “I don’t know when to hold back. When I decided to do this show, I was sure that whatever I do, I’ll do a 100% and won’t make anything up. I’m not an actress and have never faced the camera. It was definitely a little daunting. The only thing was I wasn’t going to be insensitive to anyone,” she says.

And Seema certainly was herself on the show. No holds barred is how she talked about her personal life, and even termed hers and Sohail’s marriage as “unconventional”.

What also got talked about is how all the star kids — her sons Nirvaan and Yohan, Sanjay Kapoor’s kids Shanaya and Jahaan, Shah Rukh Khan’s daughter Suhana Khan and more, were featured on the show. People thought it was like an audition showreel. Seema has a clear take on this. “It’s a reality show about our lives. These children are our lives. The biggest part of any woman’s life is her family and children. To not have them would be going completely against reality!” she quips.

So tomorrow, will she be okay with her sons getting into acting and the nepotism debate that will follow them? “Talent has to speak. We have actors in the industry, who’ve hailed from big film families, who haven’t made it, including my own husband. Nepotism doesn’t mean you’re going to make it,” concludes Seema.

Along with an attack on our health, this year saw an assault of another kind, equally discussed. The attack on Bollywood royalty. Superstars were "shown their place", say critics, especially on social media, as the aam junta questioned their entitlement, the power of privilege that comes with being someone important's someone.

Ironically, a new digital show that's been at the centre of much chatter, discusses and celebrates this very privilege, as it puts four wives of Bollywood stars—Neelam Kothari (married to Samir Soni), Seema Khan (Sohail Khan), Maheep Kapoor (Sanjay Kapoor) and Bhavana Pandey (Chunky Pandey; is mother to Ananya Panday)—in the spotlight. The Fabulous Lives of Bollywood Wives promises to offer entry into filmi families, which have been at the vortex of the nepotism debate recently. "People will finally know that our lives aren't glamorous 24/7. And, that we are not perfect!" says Khan, wife to Sohail Khan, brother to Bollywood's biggest superstar Salman Khan and daughter-in-law to veteran scriptwriter Salim Khan. Kothari argues that they may look perfect, but that doesn't mean, "they don't have their insecurities".

Whatever the protagonists may say, the audiences are going to watch for a glimpse of the perfection and glamour that defines, even if erroneously, Bollywood. What is going to come as a surprise though, is the candidness with which the show is presented. Khan confesses that she is obsessed with the Kardashians, while actor Samir Soni discusses Neelam's fear of facing audience judgment with a return to screen after years. And Pandey laughs about her love of "water bras". And they all have real jobs. Kothari and Kapoor are jewellery designers; Pandey runs a fashion brand called Love Gen; Khan is a fashion designer. But as Kapoor says, their kids come before career. Pandey adds, "We will be in super important meetings, but when your child calls, it means you have to put them before anything and everything."

The show, produced by Karan Johar, is full of real, and some hilarious moments. Some of it is over the top, yes, but all of it, entertaining.

When we get on a Zoom call with the four, they seem to be a bunch not too concerned about challenging any odd perceptions you may have. Pandey, who comes across as the most grounded, says, "Honestly, this show was not intended to challenge misconceptions. We are not trying to prove anything. We are behaving the way we would ordinarily—we are women who multitask, like every woman out there." Kapoor says they are an emotional bunch. They've known each other for 20-odd years, and that's what people will see. "That's close to 25 years of relationships and friendship. I am hoping women will connect with us."

Interestingly, the four weren't very keen to put themselves out there when the idea was presented to them. Kothari says different triggers set each of them off, and all of them lost their cool at some point while shooting. But it was the kids who got them to see its relevance in perspective. As Kapoor says, "It was very nerve-racking to put ourselves out there. But our kids made us see the light—life is short, who says no to Dharmatic [Johar's Dharma Productions] and Netflix! Tell your stories. And suddenly, we all said, 'why not, we must!'"

Kothari: That's the misconception in any field. You have to work hard to get where you are. You will never see success if you don't work hard.

Pandey: We are privileged, and we are blessed. But, there is everything else that comes with it. We experience the emotions you do—we are happy and sad. Ours is like any other family.

Kapoor: Very! Neelam was like 'hell, no!' Seema said yes, and Bhavna was thinking about it. Did we want people to judge us, and give so much access? No.

Pandey: I had been planning—okay, I will be controlled, and I will say this, and do that. But after a while, we went back to who we were. How long can you pretend?

Khan: I was fine till the shoot started. Then, when the cameras were in our house, we panicked a bit.

Kothari: I think what helped was that we had known each other for 25 years.

Kapoor: We are very possessive mothers. That will resonate for sure.

Pandey: We all multistask like everyone else, especially like everyone has during the pandemic!

Khan: Maheep is obviously Samantha, and Neelam is very much like Charlotte. I think Bhavana and I oscillate, and have a bit of both Miranda and Carrie in us.

Neelam Kothari, Bhavana Pandey, Maheep Kapoor and Seema Khan

MID-DAY (March 9, 2017)

Chunky Pandey's daughter Ananya is all grown up and looks gorgeous in her recent pictures! Seema Khan took to Instagram to share a snapshot of Ananya in a pink lehenga and she looks breathtaking!

While sharing the photo, Seema Khan wrote, "How pretty does @ananyapandey look in this printed organza lehenga specially made for her for a recent wedding...."

On Thursday, Sohail Khan kicked off the first schedule of Kabir Khan's 2017 Eid release, Tubelight, in the mountains of Ladakh. Set in the '50s, the emotional drama has Sohail playing Salman Khan's mute, younger brother.

Speaking to Mirror just before he jetted off, the filmmaker-actor had seemed excited about having finally landed a great acting gig. “I am only doing Tubelight so that I can be around Kabir and Salman bhai, there is so much to learn from them. I'll be shooting until February so I'll only start thinking of my next script by mid-next year,“ he informed, admitting candidly that he knows that he's not a saleable actor. “But I can play a great character role, I don't even care if it's just a guest appearance. I was getting rubbish roles anyway, thank God I had a production house that I could fall back on so that I could produce and direct films.“

In 2014, when Sohail had been toying with the idea of making a sports film, while in Delhi, he visited one of the capital's best golf courses. He thought it would be a boring day on the course, but he had a blast, hitting the ball everywhere but into the hole. “The only person safe from my swings was the man standing behind me,“ laughed Sohail who on his return to Mumbai, began writing a story about Ali, a mohalla boy who visits a golf course to extort some money, gets hooked to the rich man's sport and becomes an inspiration to lower-middle-class kids who believe tennis, squash, billiards are out of their reach. Nawazuddin Siddiqui plays Ali. The actor had played a Pakistani journalist in Kabir Khan's earlier film, Bajrangi Bhaijaan. The day after the screening, Sohail narrated the story of Ali to him and told him that if he was interested, he'd re-work the character keeping him in mind. Scripting continued for the next four months. During this time, Arbaaz joined the cast as the quirky goon. Actor-turned-fashion maverick, Jas Arora, was roped in to play a royal reigning golfer and Amy Jackson as an international sports agent.

“I've been practising the game for the last one year and golf has taught me the virtue of patience. MS Dhoni, Sachin Tendulkar and even F1 racers are playing the sport today to stay focussed,“ Sohail pointed out, delighted to have wrapped up the film in 40 days with shoots in Mumbai, Delhi and Pune and within a certain budget. “My father (scriptwriter Salim Khan) told me to be practical and stick to a plan. This is the first time my production costs run into single digits,“ he said.

He's also got rid of his temper and, with elder son Nirvaan introducing him to new shows on streaming sites like Netflix, he insisted he has evolved. “The audience has moved from Yo Yo Honey Singh to Badshah and I don't want to be caught listening to Daler Mehendi,“ he reasoned.

Meanwhile, the senior Khans have decided that the generation next--Sohail's sons, Nirvaan and Yohaan and Arbaaz's son Arhaan - should explore the world before stepping into the film industry. “My 14-year-old son wants to be an actor but I want him to finish his basic education and travel first. He must understand that income and popularity fluctuate so one shouldn't get carried away by stardom,“ he asserted.

He recalled a man outside a restobar who asked him for a selfie, then retorted, “Kyun, you think you are a bada star!“ On another occasion, a customs officer asked him not to take the green channel and not act pricey because “Tu bhai nahin hai“. Today, after these rude jolts, Sohail has shut the doors to his life not just to the paparazzi, but also his close buddies. “Even they don't know who the real Sohail Khan is today and what he is up to because I no longer share anything private even with my friends,“ he admitted.

Of late, there's been plenty of buzz about a liaison which reportedly caused ripples in his 18-year marriage with Seema Sachdev Khan. He argued that for someone to pick up the newspaper every morning, there has to be something controversial and intriguing. “Everyone's inquisitive and wants a piece of the celebrity-pie. That's okay, but when they become judgemental and start forming perceptions, it becomes worrying. There's always the other person's side to any story, even celebs are normal guys, even we have parents and family, spare us please!“ he entreated, adding that his father had asked all his kids to pick up a hobby like Salman that would bring them peace. “Salman bhai's not obsessed with being No. 1, he's happy with his films, his charity, his TV show and his painting. He's not in the rat race. In the last five years we've seen that he no longer runs behind anyone, it's success that chases after him. We are watching him and learning how it all falls in place,“ he signed off with a smile.

Sonakshi Sinha, who recently returned from a work trip in New York, ushered in her 29th birthday with gal pals Seema Khan, Maheep Kapoor, Bhavana Pandey and designer Laila Motwane at a private bash on Wednesday night. While Sona and Seema turned up in colour-coordinated whites, the girl gang danced the night away on some of their fave tracks. The group was later joined by Sona's close friend, Bunty Sajdeh. On Thursday, Seema sent birthday greetings to Sona on the social media with snapshots from the bash. 

Meanwhile, the actress kicked off the day by sharing a teaser of her next, the coming-of-age drama Noor which is based on Pakistani journalist-writer Saba Imtiaz's 2014 novel, Karachi You're Killing Me!, in which she plays the titular character. The film rolls in Mumbai, this July. “I can't wait to begin this journey. It's already on such a positive note. Thank you all for the overwhelming response. That's been the best birthday gift so far,“ Sona posted online.

Here's wishing Shotgun Jr many more gloriously happy returns of the day.