Why does Shah Rukh Khan not age?

Why does Shah Rukh Khan not age? He turned 61 on November 2. When Amitabh Bachchan was 60, he made a movie called Baghban, where he played an old man betrayed by his sons. When Dilip Kumar was 59, he was acting in movies like Shakti, where he was Amitabh Bachchan's father. Can you imagine Shah Rukh Khan playing anyone's father? Even if he takes on such a role, it will not be from beginning to end. There will be a young Shah Rukh in the plot to compensate for the older version.

He might not even look the part of an old man. He is lean muscle, without an iota of flab. The hair is just as dense as it was decades ago. How can a human being not age? He does. Movie stars put considerable effort and resources into keeping that look going. The superstar might be a god for fans, but he is not god. He is just as much a victim to the tyranny of time. Hair will fall, wrinkles will bunch up around throats. You just won't see it. That still does not explain why an earlier generation couldn't do the same.

The answer, one suspects, is that it is not just in the world of cinema, but in the world in general that one does not feel as old as one used to do at a particular age. If you had a grandfather or great-grandfather in the 1970s or 1980s, they had firmly written themselves into the category of old age by the time they were in their 50s. Who today feels like that? The world is designed to postpone old age. Did Dilip Kumar ever hit the gym in his 60s? One is willing to bet Shah Rukh spends hours daily in there. He carefully chooses what he eats. And so on. A version of this, perhaps not with manic intensity, plays out in the regular world too. Men and women work out more. They know what a good diet is. The medicines are better. And the bank won't allow you to think of retirement because you still have EMIs. What used to be old age is middle age now. That is why Shah Rukh Khan does not age and neither do his fans.