Reproduced with kind permission from Mid-Day is Bachchan's tell-all interview to the newspaper's Upala KBR:

There has been speculation about Aishwarya Rai being unlucky for your family.

This is very insensitive. First, there were reports about her being a manglik before marriage, and then getting married to a tree, and now this. Every day there is some prediction about what she is, what her future will be, yeh jis ghar mein jayegi uska father-in-law mar jayega (her father-in-law will die). Aishwarya is not unlucky for us! Whatever is fated will happen.

It's all very well for the media to speculate and write, but has anyone thought about what she and her family must be going through? The worst is that the speculation has not stopped. Yeh ho gaya, woh ho gaya (this has happened, that has happened) -- all because of Aishwarya!

Have they any idea what she and Abhishek are really going through? What's marriage but the belief between two people? It's not scientific or ritualistic. It's about two minds connecting. This is my wife and she will be my wife for the rest of my life. That's it.

Do you believe in astrology?

No, I don't. Before Zanjeer released, Jaya and me had decided that if Zanjeer is a hit, we will go to London for a holiday, as I had never been abroad. When it became a hit and we told our parents that we are going on a holiday, my father said, 'If you go on a holiday with her, you must marry her.' I said fine, we got married and left. Abhishek and Aishwarya are fond of each other.

In New York, after the premiere of Guru, Abhishek called me and said that he proposed to her. I said, 'Come on home.' I asked Aishwarya if she was happy. She said yes. I picked them up and took her home. I told her, this is your home. Humko kya lena dena hai aur kuch se? (How does anything else matter?)

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