4 min readHyderabadJul 8, 2026 08:37 PM IST
Actor Gaurav Khanna is set to enter Netflix’s reality show Lock Upp Sach Ya Sazaa as a special visitor, the makers have announced. His entry is expected to be among the most talked-about moments of the season, since his estranged wife Akanksha Chamola is currently inside the house.
Akanksha Chamola has been at the centre of the show since its premiere on June 27, when she announced that her marriage to Gaurav Khanna was effectively over, a disclosure that took viewers by surprise given the picture of togetherness the couple had maintained publicly.
“Gaurav and I are getting a divorce. We have been living separately for the last year. It was a mutual decision. We have been sitting on it for the last year. Things are not bad between Gaurav and me. We still talk to each other. We don’t think we are compatible as partners because we see very different futures, and unfortunately, they’re not together,” she said on the premiere night.
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She added that the separation had stayed hidden even as the two kept up appearances. “There is no bad blood. It was all happening while Gaurav Khanna was on Bigg Boss. Our parents thought that if we lived away from each other, we might revive things, clear things out. Everyone thought it would happen, since we were seen together socially, supported each other at events, and shared everything daily, but we didn’t feel like a married couple. I think this will also be big news for the families,” she said.
In a later episode, during a conversation with fellow inmates Shreya Kalra and Sufi Motiwala, Akanksha Chamola explained what pulled the marriage apart. “When we were married, I never had any maternal instinct. But I was open to discovering it; it was never shut down. Gradually, I realised I am not meant for it. He was okay with it, but I guess with time, that shifted. Now he wants to have kids, and when I see that, I cannot give him that ever. I had told him long back, when I had realised I was not cut out to be a mother, that I would never become a mother,” she said. “We had a discussion where I told him that you can leave me and that it would be fair, because this is why most people marry. Then Bigg Boss happened, and I realised that he wants to have a kid badly, and I cannot do it. I didn’t want to put him in that situation.”
In the episodes since, Akanksha Chamola has also spoken about being bisexual before her marriage and, most recently, about wanting to stay single after the divorce.
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Also Read: ‘She’s my wife’: Gaurav Khanna reacts to Akanksha Chamola’s divorce announcement
Gaurav Khanna, for his part, has responded to the announcement with warmth. “I am doing the same as I always was, nothing has changed. The love is still the same, and the support is still the same. I will always support Akanksha, she’s my wife, after all. If I’ve loved her, why would I ever step back? I will always stand up for her. I have always supported her. I wish she plays the game well and wins,” he said.
His entry as a special visitor will nonetheless be his first response inside the house, and the show’s format leaves little room for guarded answers. Lock Upp Sach Ya Sazaa, produced by Ekta Kapoor’s Balaji Telefilms for Netflix, is built around confession as currency, with Farah Khan and Riteish Deshmukh presiding as Jailers over tasks, chargesheets and punishments across six weeks.
Gaurav Khanna and Akanksha Chamola married on November 24, 2016, in a three-day celebration in his hometown Kanpur, and their relationship had long been admired by television audiences. Gaurav Khanna, best known as Anuj Kapadia in Anupamaa, has had a winning run in reality formats, taking the Celebrity MasterChef trophy and later winning Bigg Boss. The current Lock Upp season features Ram Kapoor, Shivangi Joshi, Sunita Ahuja, Madhuri Jain Grover and Shilpa Shinde among its inmates, with Kangana Ranaut, host of the original season, having entered as Janta Ki Awaaz in the opening week.
