Actor Markand Soni is coming back to Hindi films after a gap of almost 12 years with Brahamastra. The 25-year-old started his career at the age of three and has been a part of several commercials and a popular TV show Kya Aap Paanchvi Pass Se Tez Hain, where he shared the screen with Bollywood actor Shah Rukh Khan.

While working with Khan has always filled him with memories, there’s one incident, he can never forget. Soni who was barely eleven back recalls giving health advice to Khan. “One day backstage I saw him smoking. So I walked up to him and asked ‘Sir, smoking? It is not good’,” recalls adding, “I was naive. I was a child and innocent. Today I would not (even) dare to say that to someone. Back then I walked up to him, very innocently, and I was like ‘Sir you shouldn’t do it. Sir aapko pata hai, isse cancer hota hai’”.

While what Soni did was in absolute juvenility, Khan’s response to it is something that won his heart. “Ideally someone else would just finish what they start and would’ve finished smoking.

His reaction was the sweetest thing someone did. He looked behind, gave the bud to his assistant and said, ‘Okay, I won’t smoke from now on’. Every time he saw me walking up to him and he had a cigarette in his hand, he would hide it behind his back, or hand it over to someone before I could see. That is the sweetest thing somebody has ever done. I remember I would notice that and back then I was like Sir jhut bol rahe hai. But now when I look behind it, I think it was so thoughtful. He ensured that when I was around he wouldn’t smoke,” Soni narrates.