Born in 1974 to Javed Akhtar and Honey Irani, Farhan has been on the inside track of the film industry from the word go. The exposure to film and film personalities through his formative years left an indelible mark n him. He first started off as an assistant to Pankaj Parashar on 'Himalaya Putra' (where he first met Akshaye). It was followed by three years in a television software production house Script Shop, as an assistant to Adi Pocha, where his job function ranged from being production manager to assistant director (post production), from scripting commercials and sitcoms to making corporate AV's. These years proved to be the growing years for Farhan. This mixture of creative license and responsibility helped build Farhan's confidence in himself. After leaving Script Shop, Farhan co-directed Shankar Mahadevan's music video 'Breathless' and Pentagram's 'Price of Bullets' with sister Zoya. It was during this period that he started work on a script, tentatively titled 'Hum Teen'. Two years later, the script was called 'Dil Chahta Hai'.