Juhi Chawla is one of the co-owners of Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) with Shah Rukh Khan and her husband Jay Mehta. The actress recently recalled the time when they were putting everything together ahead of the first season of Indian Premier League (IPL). Revealing how Lalit Modi approached her and Shah Rukh to buy a team, Juhi saif at an event by Gujarat Chamber of Commerce & Industry, said that Modi wanted “glamorous people” as team owners in the IPL.
She said, “Lalit wanted the owners to be glamorous people and have some glitz to them and he approached us and said, Shah Rukh and you are one of the team owners. At that time, I thought in India, cricket and film industry, those are the two most popular things, I thought how nice it would be if we can be a part of cricket.”
Sharing that they all did not know how to run a franchise, Juhi recalled going to Shah Rukh’s house for meetings, and talking about putting the jingle together and thinking about uniforms. Juhi said, “He made it black and gold and I was not happy with it. I thought ‘what is this black and gold?’ Because black is considered inauspicious.”
She further asserted how all the Kolkata Knight Riders meetings happened late at night, and soon she stopped attending them. “Shah Rukh used to be busy during the days. He was working a lot so our meetings would be scheduled for 10 pm. They would start by 11 pm. Then everyone would talk for a while so by the time the meeting would start, it would be 12-12:30 pm and I would start dozing off in the meeting. After 2-3 meetings, I stopped attending. I said you guys do this, I am not coming,” Juhi shared.
KKR has won the IPL trophy three times, in 2012, 2014 and recently, in 2024.
