With half the Bollywood wishing to have the famous lucky surname ‘Khan’, actor Irrfan Khan has dropped his surname. Appraently the reason behind it is that he doesn’t want his surname to act as deterrent for movies. In the past, the actor has been refusing film offers that have a religious or cultural connotation to it. Irrfan has refused roles in ‘Kurbaan’, ‘Midnight’s Children’ and Mira Nair’s ‘Reluctant Fundamentalist’. In fact, one of the reasons Irrfan refused ‘Black Friday’ was because the “film went into uncomfortable areas of religion and politics.”

The actor who admits of feeling like an Indian after playing the role of ‘Paan Singh Tomar’ seems to be bogged by the “constant pressure to state my religion on the passport, every time I travel.” He says and we quote: “Religion is a personal matter and should not be used as a base for work or anything else.”