15 Things About Zakir Khan – The ‘Boy Next Door’ of Indian Stand-up Comedy

Zakir Khan was born on the 20th of August, 1987 in Indore, Madhya Pradesh where his grandfather moved to from Rajasthan. Khan’s zodiac sign is Leo, and he is currently 29 years old.

Zakir was born to Ismail Khan and Kulsum Khan. His father, Ismail Khan, is a music teacher at St. Raphael’s School, Indore. His mother is a homemaker. Zakir’s grandfather, Ustad Moinuddin Khan, was a musician. Zakir has two brothers- Zeeshan Khan, who is the lead singer at Malang- a music band, and Arbaaz Khan, who is a student.

Zakir loves playing Sitar. He likes singing and composing songs.

In conversation with Chaaipani, Zakir says that he was bullied as a child. He was made fun of very often for his complexion and appearance. He explains that these incidents made him bold and humor became his shield. According to Zakir, one should wear his individuality as a badge and not a baggage.

Zakir has a diploma in Sitar. He was pursuing B.Com but he dropped out of the college midway. This is what he had to say about this:

Yaar , college mein rehne ka koi matlab nahi tha. Classes hum attend karte nahi the, aur degree se jyada apni khwahisho se pyaar tha

It is rightly said that if God bestowed you with talent, he will also provide you the courage to pursue it.

Zakir wanted to become a Radio producer for which he moved to Delhi. He did a radio programming at ARSL for a year and then shifted to Jaipur in 2009 for an internship. Delhi made him feel out of place and alienated. Dropping out of college and pursuing a career in Radio was challenging and was called into question by his family. So, in order to cope up with the mounting tension, Zakir stopped taking money from his family. He lied about having a job. He would do odd jobs to keep himself going. When he was leaving Jaipur, he didn’t have money to pay the rent but God bless the landlord who wrote it off and even offered money to Zakir to travel back. In his conversation with chaaipani, Zakir recalls

I have always had the pleasure of meeting and being close to some of the most amazing people in life. The ones that taught me how to add life in my years. The first was my dad and then a long string of amazing human beings followed and I couldn’t be thankful enough.

Zakir’s knowledge of Sitar would help him keep himself fed when he came back to Delhi. He shared the room with Vishwas, and they lived like a family, sharing the money they earned to help each other. These were the years when Zakir explored himself and tried to make use of every possible skill that he possessed. He did theater, Radio and also performed for AIR. He built himself and his growth chart was so impressive that he started to receive offer letters from all the companies that had rejected him before. But, Zakir never worked for those companies for they had questioned his skills. He eventually ended up working for HT Radio where he hadn’t applied before.

His roommate Vishwas encouraged Zakir to do open mics in Delhi. That’s how it started, Khan would perform in cafes and people would like his jokes.  All of Khan’s performances would end up in standing ovations. People would keep attending his shows even when they were familiar with his jokes because it wasn’t just about his jokes, it was how he delivered it. There was an honesty in his performance that people could relate with. Later, he was called to Mumbai to write for a news comedy show- On Air with AIB. 

Zakir rose to popularity when he won the India’s best Standup Comedian competition organized by Comedy Central in 2012.

Zakir says that his success has been a contribution of so many people which in turn makes him a very down to Earth person. Zakir believes that one needs to preserve the good memories and recall them when things are not going right. Memories of good times give you warmth and keep you going no matter what.

Khan’s friends from home would call him and ask him if he visited the famous places in Delhi like Qutub Minar or Red Fort, but what interested Khan was not the historical monuments but the day to day life in Delhi. He wished to explore the native people of Delhi and their struggles. Doesn’t that rightfully describes his poetic inclinations?!

Zakir believes that talent isn’t all one need to succeed. He gives more importance to perseverance and consistency. Zakir admits being a very lazy person. His mantra to keep himself going is funny. He reminds himself that he is ugly and no one loves him, so he has to work in order to achieve whatever he desires.

In his interview with The Hindu where he was asked to differentiate between humor and vulgarity he said,

For me it is about the experiences one has in life and not vulgarity. Also we live in such a hypocritical society that when it comes to talking about one’s experience on public forums, people go on a back foot. And stand up comedy is one such tool to break that myth(sic).

Coming from a musical background, Zakir was surprised to find people listening to music just for fun without realizing what goes into its making, when he came to Delhi. He remarked, “ye log maze k liye bhi music sunte hain?!” 

This video gives you a glimpse of Zakir Khan on Sitar.

Zakir shares a very special relation with his father. His father has been very supportive of him and his ventures. Here’s a very emotional video of Zakir sharing few stories about his father’s love and sacrifice.

Me: Abbaji aap saari duniya ghume ho, sabse aacha sheher kaun sa laga ? Abbaji(dada): “beta artist Ka koi sheher Nahi hota, artist toh banjara hota hai.” “Jahan log pasand karte hai wahan zarur Jao aur Jahan log kam-pasand karte hai wahan bar-bar jao. Taki tum logon ka mizaj samjh sako aur log tumhari tabiyat”. Yeh hai Meri neev, yeh hai Meri shuruwat 🙂

A post shared by Zakir Khan (@zakirkhan_208) on Jul 8, 2016 at 9:23am PDT

In one of his posts on Instagram, Zakir mentioned Vipul Goyal (a famous standup comedian) as his inspiration. Zakir’s favorite actor is Nawazuddin Siddiqui and favorite filmmaker is Anurag Kashyap. His favorite poets are Mirza Ghalib and John Elia.

Khan reportedly said that what Gutthi does is not comedy. Guthhi is a female role played by Sunil Grover in Comedy Nights With Kapil. He says that comedy, especially in Delhi has become mature and versatile and characters like Guthhi haven’t evolved similarly. He called Kapil Sharma’s comedy very Punjabi, where you make people laugh by insulting others. Khan does not find it specifically funny.

Zakir Khan is on Instagram with the username @zakirkhan_208. He flaunts more than 54 thousand followers and has more than one Million followers on Facebook(Zakir Khan facebook page). He is also on Twitter with around 50k followers(@Zakirism).

Khan co-hosted the 5th Annual Golden Kela Awards and shared the stage with popular figures like Papa CJ and Vir Das. He has also co-hosted and written scripts of On Air With AIB.

Khan is also being featured in the ad of Nestaway- home rental marketplace.

These are some of his popular performances:

You can also subscribe to his youtube channel for your laughter doze here.

Zakir is a known face in the comedy industry now. He does not only perform in India but in other foreign countries as well. So, it is no issue if you are outside India just keep checking event sites for his shows. Our boy is an international comedian now.

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