Akshay Kumar: I don’t believe in drastic body makeovers

At a time when actors are going out of their way to gain or lose weight for a particular film role, superstar Akshay Kumar says he does not believe in drastic body makeover for a film.

Akshay, 48, said he has never been in the race to have a certain body type.

“I lead a very healthy lifestyle and I don’t believe in drastic body makeovers for film roles. As I shoot back-to-back and if I start following a certain diet or exercise then it would take a toll on my health. I always leave the margin of either 6kg more or less,” he told PTI.

Akshay would be next seen in Raja Krishna Menon’s “Airlift”, which is based on the civil evacuation of Indians from Kuwait during the Iraq-Kuwait war.

“I was not aware about this issue at all. I had no knowledge about it. I was shocked when I read and heard the script of ‘Airlift’ from my director.”

The “Baby” star said the script of the film is powerful and he has full faith in Menon, who is returning to direction after a gap of six years.

“When a script is powerful then a director automatically gets the confidence. I have worked with 18-19 new directors in the film… Some made it and some didn’t. I believe in the script,” he said.

Making a film on the world’s biggest civil evacuation was not an easy task for Menon and the director says he made the movie because he wanted to celebrate the achievement of Indians.

“When I realised 1,70,000 people were brought back to India on commercial aircrafts, I felt it was a huge achievement and we should celebrate this.

“Making people aware of it is actually celebrating the issue. When I read about it, I felt proud to be a part of India that would do this.”

“Airlift”, which releases this Friday, stars Nimrat Kaur opposite Akshay.

Inputs by PTI