Bollywood Home » Bollywood Screenwriters » Salim Khan Born in 1935 in Indore, Salim Khan is a notable Indian actor and one of the popular Bollywood screenwriters. Salim Khan wrote several screenplays for Bollywood movies in the 1970s. He worked together with the famous writer Javed Akhtar and together they became well-known as Salim-Javed.

Salim's father was a police officer and his mother died when he was still young. He married a non-Muslim woman, a Hindu from Maharashtra in 1964. As is conventional amongst the Muslims, she was asked to convert to Islam before her marriage. She changed her name from Sushila to Salma after her marriage with Salim. Salim and Salma have had four children named Salman, Arbaaz, Sohail and Alvira.

Salim married for the second time in his life in the late 1970s. The lady was the famous dancer and actress Helen, who lived in a separate household. They also adopted a daughter named Arpita.



Film director K. Amarnath saw Salim at a wedding ceremony and was impressed by his fine looks. He then asked Salim to come to Mumbai, where he hired him as an actor for Rs. 400 a month. Salim performed in numerous movies, in large and small parts, for almost 7 years. Some of the movies where he appeared include:

• Teesri Manzil (1966)
• Sarhaadi Lootera (1966)
• Diwana (1967)

His life as an actor was changed thoroughly after his meeting with Javed Akhtar on the set of 'Sarhaadi Lootera'. Javed who was initially a clapper boy, later developed his talent in dialogue writing. The duo formed a scriptwriting team, known as Salim-Javed. It is one of the most famous pairs of Bollywood screenwriting. Their first big success was the script for 'Seeta aur Geeta' which was released in the year 1972. They also had super hit scripts like 'Zanjeer' (1973), 'Deewaar' (1975), 'Sholay' (1975), 'Trishul' (1978) in their bags.

Salim Khan won many awards for his great work. He won the Filmfare Award for Best Screenplay for the film 'Shakti'. In year 1976 he bagged the Best Dialogue Writer for the film Deewaar (1975). He also got the Best Screenplay award for the same film. He and Javed Akhtar together got the Filmfare Award for Best Screenplay in 'Zanzeer'.

But the duo did not continue working together for long. They split up in the early 1980s and since then none of them has had much success in scriptwriting.

Online information on Salim Khan is provided by sitagita.