‘Aishwarya Rai got paid more than I’: When Abhishek Bachchan spoke about their movies together

The gender wage-gap has long kept women from making it big in many industries, including Bollywood. Many actors have raised the issue over the years about how they often receive a smaller remuneration than their male counterparts for the same work.

However, many actors have also denied the same. In 2018, Abhishek Bachchan had revealed that his wife Aishwarya Rai was paid more than him in eight out of nine movies that they did together.

During an event in 2018, filmmaker Shoojit Sircar had asked Abhishek about whether he would be comfortable with his daughter becoming an actor. He said, “No. But before I answer that, I would like to give this some context and perspective. The two women who are close to me, my mother and my wife have worked in the industry on their own terms. They’ve never been forced to do anything they didn’t want to do.”

He added, “There’s a huge debate on gender parity in the film business and in other industries. I’ve worked in nine films with my wife and in eight of those, she’s got paid more than I have. The highest-paid actor in Piku was Deepika (Padukone). It’s a business and if you are a saleable actor, you get paid accordingly. You can’t be a new actress and demand to be paid the same as Shah Rukh Khan.”

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Abhishek and Aishwarya have worked together in films such as Kuch Na Kaho, Guru, Raavan, Dhoom 2, Dhai Akhsar Prem Ke, Sarkar Raj, Umrao Jaan and Bunty Aur Babli. Aishwarya made her debut with Tamil film Iruvar in 1997. Abhishek entered the film industry three years later in 2000 with JP Dutta’s Refugee.

They got married in 2007 and their daughter Aaradhya was born in 2011.