JYOTHI VENKATESH REMEMBERS DILIP KUMAR WHO PASSED AWAY TODAY MORNING
By Jyothi Venkatesh
Today morning, though I knew it had to happen any day, I got the biggest shock of my life when I woke up to the news that my favorite actor Dilip Kumar had passed away. They say that in Bollywood, you cannot become a star if you don’t have a bit of Dilip Kumar in you. From Dharmendra, Rajendra Kumar , Amitabh Bachchan and Manoj Kumar down to Aamir Khan, Govinda and Shah Rukh Khan, to even Aman Verma. They say that about Amitabh Bachchan and his impact in the film industry too. Actors Mukesh Khanna and Sudesh Berry too had followed in the footsteps of Amitabh Bachchan as far as their mannerisms were concerned. Amitabh Bachchan and Dilip Kumar’s influence can be felt in every generation of stars who have come after him.
Dilip Kumar, Dev Anand and Raj Kapoor were the ruling triumvirate in the good old golden era of Bollywood way back in the 50’s, 60’s and right through the70’s. Though luckily I could meet and talk to Raj Kapoor quite often thanks to his friendly PR person Bunny Reuben as well as Dev Anand, because he was a lively self effacing PR person himself, as an up and coming new and raw journalist, I had very few opportunities to meet Dilip Kumar because by the time I had become a freelance film journalist, Dilip Kumar had almost stopped acting and reveled in taking it easy and there were several newer actors who had invaded the scene, like Rajendra Kumar, Vinod Mehra, Sunil Dutt, Amitabh Bachchan, Shatrughan Sinha, Randhir Kapoor , Rishi Kapoor Vinod Khanna etc.
Off and on I had the proud privilege of meeting and talking to Dilip Kumar not only at parties like the one held for his film Qilla as well as on the location shooting of Sudhakar Bokade’s film Izzatdar or for that matter the Kerala outdoor location of producer Yash Johar’s film Duniya. I should say that listening to the great actor was like attending a Master Class lecture on acting since he was knowledgeable and had the gift of the gab.
At the outdoor location of the shooting of Izzatdar at Chennai, it was lunch time and Dilip Kumar and all of us journalists who had been flown to the location from Mumbai by the PR person R. R Pathak joined him for a sumptuous South Indian lunch. In those good old days in the 80’s, there was no system of the so called vanity vans or managers and secretaries tagging to the super stars, like these days. I luckily got the opportunity to sit bang next to Dilip Kumar and when we were waiting for the staff to come and serve us the typical South Indian lunch on our banana leaves on the table.
Dilip saab quipped to me, “The first time I had come to Madras as Chennai was called then, and shooting at the Vijaya Vauhini Studios owned by producer Nagi Reddy,I had made a big fool of myself when we were all asked to sit on the floors as was the traditional custom down South when one had lunch and being a Peshawar born guy who did not know that I would be working in several South Indian productions on my career later on, I comfortably sat flat on the banana leaf itself though I was supposed to actually sit cross legged in front of it . Producer Nagi Reddy who was standing next to me for lunch saved me from embarassment by quietly whispering in my ears that the food would be served on the banana leaf and we had to sit not on it but bang opposite it.”
Dilip Kumar –Saira Banu has been a married couple for the last 55 years, though Bollywood is notorious for its break ups. Like Jeetendra-Shobha Kapoor (almost 44 years) Manoj Kumar-Shashi (married for over 53 years), it is a marriage that has stood the test of time. As far as the Dilip Kumar- Saira Banu prem kahani is concerned, it wasn’t exactly a kissa of boy meets girl
He was the intractable tragedy king. She was the sassy Kashmiri lass in Junglee. Heart-broken after his failed affairs with Kamini Kaushal earlier and Madhubala, Dilip Kumar fell for Naseem Bano’s daughter Saira Banu. The wedding bells rang on October 11, 1966, when most of the teenyboppers’ hearts were broken when they came to know that their favorite actor Dilip Kumar, who had shot to dizzy heights of fame with the success of his romantic films like Devdas and Mughal E Azam, had married Saira Banu. It was when I was a shy school boy at that time while Saira was literally the flavor of the season in the 60’s in Bollywood, with hit films like Junglee, Purab Aur Paschim etc.
It was the most sensational ever marriage way back in 1966 when a young 22 year old Saira Banu who was the dream girl of every young man in town proposed to the matinee idol Dilip Kumar and what’s more, married him too. Like today Salman Khan is at 55, at 44, Dilip Kumar was the most eligible bachelor boy around at that point of time when every other top actor whether it was Raj Kapoor, or Dharmendra or Sunil Dutt or for that matter, Manoj Kumar was hooked, booked and married. Post-honeymoon: They made appearances together in Gopi and Sagina and Ramesh Talwar’s Duniya.
Not many are aware of the fact that Dilip Kumar had also released his second home production in Bhojpuri titled Ab To Ban Ja Sajanwa Hamaar starring Ravi Kishen, Naghma and Mona Thiba and directed by Arshad Khan under the banner of his own Sharp Focus. Dilip Kumar had also thrown a lavish party at his bungalow to celebrate the completion of the film where all of us journalists were wined and dined in the typical Dilip Kumar style. Later on, Dilip Kumar’s official attempt at directing a film called Kalinga for producer Sudhakar Bokade did not bear fruit and the film couldn’t be completed.
Once I got the shock of my life when Dilipsaab rang me up on my landline and asked me if I could convince the Filmfare guys to give him four more invitation cards for the Filmfare award function though he had already received two from the Editor, since he felt shy to call up the Editor who he knew personally and I remember though I had stopped receiving the invitations after the awards function shifted to Film City from Shanmukhananda Hall, I had called up the Editor to pass on Dilipsaab‘s request.
In spite of having been in the industry for so long, there remain certain underlying facts unknown to most. Saira reminisces how, as a graduate from London University, she had cherished dreams of meeting Dilip Saab during her childhood days. “I had to brush up my Urdu and leave no stone unturned to learn the depth of the language as I heard Saab was too good in Urdu. I was in love with the man right from the beginning. He is a linguist and I am very lucky to have been with him. In fact all my dreams and aims have been not only fulfilled but have been achieved to the fullest, Sairaji used to gush.
Saira Banu had confessed that way back in 1962 she had actually launched a film titled Palkon Ki Chhaon Mein with her mother and brother. “Since we were new to production, everything went well except the dates of the stars and finally the project was shelved. Sometime back, with Saab, we established our own production banner Sharp Focus which has produced content-oriented stuff for television too. Bhojpuri has been used in films during the 60’s also and Saab and I have done a lot of films that had an essence of Bhojpuri language. We like this language so I thought of producing a Bhojpuri film”.
“If you remember our earlier films together as a star pair, especially Bairaag and Sagina Mahato also had the flavor of Bhojpuri”, Saira Banu confided to me. Saira Banu had also gone on record to me once.”Though I have no intention to stage my come-back as an actress my dream is to produce films written by Dilip Saab, if only Saab’s health permits him and he agrees to my proposal of acting in any of these films”.
Dilip Kumar and Saira Banu were against making remakes as well as even remixes of any kind as producers. “Can you make any yesteryear films as they were made then at that point of time? You will not believe it but the fact is that a few young boys who were relatives of B.R. Chopra living in the United States of America came to Mumbai and called me and asked me to send the DVD of old Devdas. Though the new version of Devdas with Shah Rukh Khan was being shown here in the theatres, they liked the older version starring Saab”.
The marriage proved lucky professionally too with both notching up individual hit after hit after their marriage. The best thing about Dilip Kumar is that he has never been a male chauvinist who had prevented his wife from continuing to act in films, after their marriage. Dilipsaab didn’t stop Saira from acting in films and in fact glamorous roles like in Purab Aur Paschim and Victoria No 203 were actually made after their wedding. In the mid-1970s, she took on the mantle of Mrs Dilip Kumar full-time, and in the early 1980’s the childless couple successfully weathered a storm about Kumar’s clandestine marriage with a woman named Asma.
With the demise of the doyen Yusufsaab , the first ever Khan of Bollywood, in the tinsel town, a great void has been created which will never get filled up.
