Aditya Chopra pens emotional letter to Bollywood’s legendary filmmaker father at 50 years of YRF

Aditya Chopra, Bollywood’s leading filmmaker and son of the industry’s legendary figure Yash Raj Chopra, has penned a highly emotional note commemorating his late father on the occasion of his 88^th birthday coinciding with the 50^th anniversary of Yash Raj Films (YRF).

In the emotional note, Aditya illustrates the journey of his father from the humble beginning of a company in a tiny single studio room in Mumbai to becoming the biggest film company of Indian film industry. All he had was a strong belief in his talent and hard work and a dream to be self-reliant. That conviction of a creative man backing nothing but himself and his art, gave birth to YRF.  

“In 1970, my father Yash Chopra, left the security and comfort of his brother Mr. BR Chopra and formed his own company. Till then, he was a salaried employee of BR Films and didn’t own anything of his own. He did not know how to run a business and did not even have the basic knowledge of what goes into making a company,” Aditya writes.

Remarking about his directorial debut in the Bollywood, the 1995 film Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge that was released at the 25th anniversary of Yash Raj Films (YRF), Aditya said, “Besides the immense love that my father had for me, he now also had a lot of faith in my ideas because of the miraculous success of my film. The historic success of that film gave me confidence to give wings to some crazy risky ideas that I had for the future of YRF.”

Aditya had foreseen the advent of international corporate studios coming to India and taking over our business. He wanted his team to achieve a certain scale, so that they could retain their independence before the international corporates came in.

“My father contradicted his own conservative mindset and bravely indulged all my bold initiatives. And in a span of 10 quick years, we went from a film production house to India’s first fully integrated independent film studio,” Aditya said.

“Across 5 decades YRF, at its core, has been a traditional company with deep-rooted old-world values and a conservative approach to business. But at the same time, it’s also been a bold forward-looking company, constantly trying to push itself in embracing technology and innovations to be ahead of the curve. This perfect balance of traditional and modern is what defines YRF,” he elaborated on.

Penning his thoughts as YRF enter the 50^th year, Aditya quips that he is trying to figure out the secret of this 50-year success and the elements that make a company flourish for 50 years. He asks himself that is it the creative genius of Yash Chopra or the audacious vision of his 25-year old upstart son or is it just plain luck. And he gives the entire credit to the movie lovers: “It’s none of the above. It’s the people. The people who worked in each and every YRF film for the last 50 years.”

He recollects his dad using a poet’s line to describe his journey: “I walked all alone towards my destination, people kept joining and the caravan kept growing. It has taken 25 years for me to fully understand this.”

“The secret of YRF 50 are the people -- the actors, directors, writers, music directors, lyricists, cinematographers, production designers, costume designers, makeup and hair stylists, choreographers, spotboys, lightmen, setting workers, dressmen, junior artistes, stuntmen, dancers, and each and every crew member who have given their blood and sweat to all our films. The senior executives and all the employees of YRF who worked tirelessly day and night with no individual glory or fame. And finally the audience, who gave their love and faith to our films. These people are the secret of our 50 year success,” Aditya illustrated.

He expressed his deepest gratitude to each artist, worker, employee and audience of YRF; and dedicated these 50 years to all of them who are what made YRF. and the entire Indian film industry. Aditya calls it the success of the Indian film industry, which gave the platform for a self-made man to create a self-reliant, truly independent studio of the world. An industry, which gives an equal opportunity to each artist and worker to make a life for himself and his family.

He concluded the letter thanking the Indian film industry for allowing YRF to be part of its great heritage. The industry where he met the most wonderful, talented and beautiful people. The industry he hoped to be part of in every lifetime, and in any capacity whatsoever.