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Top Bollywood filmmaker Karan Johar comes out of the closet, nearly

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Sohini Mitter

on January 9, 2017

Original image has been replaced. Credit: Mashable

He is one of India's most-recognized persons. He is among the most influential when it comes to popular culture. He heads one of the top film studios in country. His productions are watched by millions. And there are more superlatives that one can attach to his name.

On the surface, Karan Johar is privileged, famous and successful. Perhaps even leading the ideal life.

But beneath the sheen of gloss and glamour, here is a 44-year-old man who's often tormented by questions about the deeply personal: his sexuality.

In a telling excerpt from his biography, An Unsuitable Boy, published by the Times of India, Johar bares it all. Almost.

In a country that is largely unkind to the unconventional, Johar has never had it easy. There has been endless conjecture about his personal life. Many unsavory statements, often in the garb of humor, have been made against him.

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And this is possibly the first time that the filmmaker-producer has gone on record to say why he's never bothered to clarify or justify himself.

He writes, "Everybody knows what my sexual orientation is. I don't need to scream it out. If I need to spell it out, I won't only because I live in a country where I could possibly be jailed for saying this. Which is why I, Karan Johar, will not say the three words that possibly everybody knows about me."

He goes on to shed light on his adolescent years when he "was combating a hundred issues" in his head. "There was a lot of turbulence in my head. For me to address it, talk about it, discuss it, was a big no-no. I brushed it under the carpet," he says.

His most aching revelation perhaps has been about the trauma he had felt when linked with his close friend and associate, also one of India's leading stars, Shah Rukh Khan.

Says Johar, "For heaven's sake, for years there were rumors about Shah Rukh and me. And I was traumatized by it... He is a father figure, an older brother to me. For me to look at him in that way or be subjected to those rumors was just ridiculous."

Johar's coming out, so to speak, has been hailed as "brave" and earned him the respect of many Indians — a populace that has traditionally concealed more than revealed.