by Dilip Kumar
Wherever we shot for Leader, be it at Agra or Jaipur, the fans somehow got a whiff of Dilip Sahab’s presence and they thronged the locations. We shot an action scene in which Dilip Sahab climbed up to the turret of a structure without a double while the unit and the spectators watched breathlessly. He wrote most of his pithy dialogue in crucial scenes on the spur of the moment. His erudition and political awareness came to the fore when he wrote lines that perhaps no one could have written for him.
If you watch Leader today you will find some of the lines spoken by Dilip Sahab so relevant to the present political climate. It just goes to prove how far-sighted he was as an intellectual.
NANDA
I CAN NEVER FORGET THE FIRST TIME I met Dilip Sahab. I was at a party, which was hosted by Bharat Bhooshanji,* before the release of Sakshi Gopal [1957] and suddenly Dilip Sahab walked in. When Dilip Kumar entered a room everybody’s attention naturally riveted on him. It was like a dream come true for me to see him in flesh and blood but I was a shy person and I knew I would never be able to go up to him and introduce myself as a fan, leave alone as a newcomer who had just made an impact with Toofan Aur Diya [1956]. I requested Bhooshanji to introduce me and he agreed, saying I should wait till the people swarming around him left him alone. I knew that it was not going to happen because people never left him alone. He was a huge star and a man who liked mingling with common folk.
As I stood at a corner of the room feeling dismayed, I could not believe my eyes as Dilip Kumar was actually walking towards me with a smile of recognition. He came up to me and asked: ‘Aren’t you Master Vinayak’s daughter?’
I could hear my heart thumping away as I said: ‘Yes!’
He smiled and repeated a dialogue from one of my father’s films in Marathi – ‘Dhonda asel tar mazya dokyavar maar’.** I was overwhelmed and speechless. He spoke so disarmingly and with such simplicity that I found my voice and told him I was his fan and my family only watched his films and so on ….
Dilip Sahab was always very protective about me because of his deep respect for my father. Every time he asked me to join a fund collection drive of the industry or any other benefit event, which he organized from time to time to assist the government in providing relief to the victims of natural calamities, he sent his secretary Premji to fetch me and ensure that I was looked after. I think his respect for the ladies and for the seniors in the industry had a lot to do with his family background and upbringing. He was the father figure to his brothers and sisters and he would certainly have had a parental upbringing that taught him to be humble and respectful.
My sister Meena was married to C. V. K. Shastry, who was a production adviser to B. R. Chopra. Dilip Sahab knew Shastryji well as he often consulted him on various matters related to production when he produced Gunga Jumna. So the ties between my family and Dilip Sahab and Saira grew stronger. As time passed Saira, though she was much younger, became a friend and my visits to their residence became frequent. In fact, Dilip Sahab stood like a family member at the religious solemnization of Meena and Shastryji’s wedding ceremony.
In my own way I had established myself in the industry as an actress and I had teamed up with every top actor in the business. The only star with whom I never got a chance to work was Dilip Kumar and that I felt was quite unfortunate. It just did not happen. How I wished for an assignment opposite him because it was the ultimate stamp of success for a star to be cast opposite Dilip Kumar!
When I voluntarily retired from films in 1974 I recall Dilip Sahab asking me why I had stopped working. I told him I felt I should bid goodbye while ‘the sun is shining’. He smiled and did not say anything. He had obliged my family by doing the formal inauguration of a road named after our father Master Vinayak near my Perry Cross Road residence in Bandra. My brother Jayprakash had gone to him and requested him to do the honours and he had instantly agreed. He was most approachable and accessible even at the peak of his stardom. All those who copy his acting have failed to borrow from him his intrinsic humility and goodness.
I returned to face the cameras in Raj Kapoor’s Prem Rog. At that time B. R. Chopra Sahab was penning the script of Mazdoor. He asked me whether I would do a small role opposite Dilip Sahab. I jumped at the opportunity. I told Chopra Sahab I would do it even if it was only one scene in the entire film with Dilip Sahab. I worked with Dilip Kumar in Mazdoor [released in 1983] and I said to myself: ‘Now your track record is complete, Nanda!’
*An actor known for playing historical characters such as Baiju Bawra (1952).
**If that is so, hit my head with a stone.
NIMMI
I HAVE A FUNNY RECOLLECTION of the first time I saw Yousuf Sahab. I was on the sets of Andaz [1949] where Mehboob Khan was picturizing a dramatic scene between Raj Kapoor and Dilip Kumar. I had settled down somewhat in Bombay after shifting from Abbottabad, the small town in Uttar Pradesh where I grew up under the care of my grandmother after my mother’s sudden death. I was nurturing a desire to get into the acting profession and my aunt Jyothi, who was an actress, had got permission from Mehboob Khan to be a quiet visitor on the sets of Andaz, which was being shot at Central Studio at Tardeo in Bombay.
This was post-independence and there was a lot happening in Delhi and UP where there were communal disturbances following Mahatma Gandhi’s assassination [on 30 January 1948]. In Bombay, too, there was curfew and restricted movements. Both Dilip Kumar and Raj Kapoor were very popular stars at that time and I was very thrilled to see them in flesh and blood on the sets of Andaz.
I was therefore all attention when Raj Kapoor was being briefed by Mehboob Sahab. Dilip Kumar, however, wasn’t being briefed and not acting at all! His body movements, his expressions and his soft modulated voice did not show any visible signs of acting! Both my grandmother and I wondered how Mehboob Sahab had chosen an actor who did not know how to act.
When the film was released, we watched it on the first day itself. And I realized what a fool I was! I found myself watching Dilip Kumar not only with admiration for the way he brought the character alive on the screen but with a sense of awe because he was holding the audience attention in every scene, without showing the strain of acting. I realized how silly I was and how little I knew about acting and the medium of cinema itself.
It was during my visit to the sets of Andaz that Raj Kapoor noticed me and offered me the second lead in Barsaat [also released in 1949] for which he was looking for a girl who possessed the simplicity and naiveté of a village girl. I was among the four girls he screen-tested and he zeroed in on me because I fit the role exactly.
Now I was required to act and I decided not to act, thinking I could be Dilip Kumar. It was a disaster. Raj Kapoor came to my house with a vermillion string that is used in poojas [prayers] and he asked me to tie it round his wrist. I asked him what it meant and he told me, ‘You are my sister from today. For heaven’s sake act and do not ruin your brother’s film.’ That did it. I understood it was not easy to be Dilip Kumar. Dilip Kumar was a special creation of the Almighty and he was blessed with a gift and ability that was rare. Lesser mortals like me had better act.
I performed as directed by Raj Kapoor. The audience and the industry welcomed me and I began to get leading role offers. Now I was yearning to work with Dilip Kumar. And lo and behold, my second film was with him! It was Aan, India’s first Technicolor film. My real learning as an actress and a woman started with Aan [1952] as I witnessed the greatness of Dilip Kumar as an actor and as a fine, unselfish and caring human being.
At the start of the casting itself he suggested to Mehboob Khan to cast Premnath [he was Raj Kapoor’s wife’s brother] as the villain. At that time Premnath was a popular lead actor and he naturally turned down the offer. But Yousuf Sahab was keen to have him cast and so took the trouble of going to Premnath’s house and convincing him to take the plunge as a villain. He promised him that the script was so good that his negative role and performance would be the talk of the industry. That’s how Premnath j
oined the cast of the film and I remember him publicly thanking Yousuf Sahab at the Ceylon [now Sri Lanka] premiere of Aan for persuading him to take the assignment.
What I wish to point out is that Yousuf Sahab is perhaps the only actor in the world who always saw to it that actors of calibre were pitted against him. In usual circumstances, actors make sure that other roles in the script are given to less competent actors so that the spotlight is completely turned on them.
All of us got tremendous mileage from Aan from the day it mounted the sets. Mehboob Khan wanted to film the movie in Technicolor and he was wondering how to accomplish the feat. There were no proper cameras and the processing had to be done in London, which meant an enormous expense and it seemed like an impossibility. Yousuf Sahab had a series of meetings with the brilliant Faredoon A. Irani and he convinced the ace cameraman that with his kind of expertise he could shoot the entire film in 16 mm and have it blown up to 35 mm. Faredoon Irani accepted the challenge.
When Aan went to the Technicolor lab in London the chief technician in the lab expressed a keenness to meet Faredoon Irani to congratulate him for the skill with which he had filmed the movie using an obsolete camera. When it was blown to 35 mm nobody could find out that it was filmed on 16 mm. All his life Irani kept telling everybody how he would never have had the courage if Yousuf Sahab hadn’t encouraged him.
That’s the wonderful quality of Yousuf Sahab. He is a great motivator. He will do everything possible to make the actors and technicians working with him achieve the impossible and the unattainable. Aan was a worldwide success. At the London premiere British actors and directors were so impressed by Yousuf Sahab that they were inviting him to settle down in the UK and work in English films. I too was asked if I would like to work in English films but the idea of kissing on screen and love scenes put me off completely.
The premiere of Aan in Ceylon was one of the biggest in terms of the massive crowds that lined the streets from the airport to the hotel where we were put up. They were all Dilip Kumar fans. Such was the mass hysteria that the crowds broke all cordons at the airport and breached security at the hotel to see him. I have never seen anything so maddening.
The enormous success of Aan was a slap in the face of critics who made sarcastic remarks at the start of the film’s shooting, saying ‘Mehboob Khan pagal ho gaya. Tragedy King Dilip Kumar ke haath mein talwar de di’. (Mehboob Khan has lost his mind, placing a sword in the hands of an actor who has only performed tragic roles.) In Aan Yousuf Sahab played a poor villager who was deft with the sword and was an expert at fencing. I remember the London distributor of the film (titled Savage Princess), Sir Alexander Korda, asking Yousuf Sahab how he performed the fencing scenes so perfectly. He was so impressed that he came to India soon after and Mehboob Sahab invited him to sound the clapper board for the first shot of Amar.
I worked in five films with Yousuf Sahab: Aan, Amar [1954], Daag [1952], Uran Khatola [1955] and Deedar [1951]. The gossip newspapers and magazines used to be ceaselessly speculating about the heroines repeatedly working with him. He was a handsome, educated and extremely charming bachelor and the biggest superstar of the time. He had the bearing of a prince and spoke both English and Urdu with ease and sophistication. It was only natural that not only his countless female fans but also the actresses who co-starred with him nurtured a secret desire to get married to him.
I was often asked then and even now whether I was also one of those who lost sleep wishing to be the one to be chosen by him for marriage. The fact is that I knew I stood no chance what with Madhubala already in his mind and heart. I preferred instead to be a good family friend and a co-star who pleased him by working with dedication. Yousuf Sahab always expected equal measure of dedication from his co-stars. Appreciation for my work coming from him was like graduation from a college for me.
His break-up with Madhubala was imminent by the time we completed the shooting of Amar. I think he came to know about Premnath and Madhubala being more than just friendly co-stars. Yousuf Sahab never revealed his feelings and being a man of few words he seldom spoke about matters other than the work we were doing.
I was close to his sisters especially his elder sister Sakina Aapa. I know how much he loved his siblings. I was the only heroine at his wedding procession, while all the others were obviously shedding tears of disappointment. I was invited on behalf of both Saira and Yousuf Bhai as Saira’s mother Naseem Banu was a dear friend. She had extended a warm invitation to me but I walked with the procession from 48 Pali Hill to 34 Pali Hill.
Saira looked so beautiful and innocent with her beautiful eyes sparkling with the happiness of getting married to the man she was in love with from the age of twelve. I think now when I see her and her exceptional love and the devotion with which she looks after him that Allah made him make the right choice and he must have done some neki (good work) for which Allah has given him Saira as a reward.
BAKUL PATEL
MY HUSBAND RAJNI PATEL AND DILIP Kumar met for the first time when Rajni was in charge of the Congress party’s election campaign of V. K. Krishna Menon, who was contesting as a candidate from the North Bombay constituency in the 1962 Lok Sabha elections. It was one of the most talked about and most written about contests in India’s political history because the race was between Congress stalwarts Krishna Menon and Acharya Kripalani, a former Congress president, who had quit that party to form his own outfit.
It was then that the enduring friendship between Rajni and Dilip Bhai began. Rajni thereafter could not think of doing anything without Dilip Bhai. Being a staunch Congress supporter Dilip Bhai was ever willing to stand by Rajni in taking forward any movement or any initiative for the Congress party. Dilip Bhai enjoyed the trust and love of Jawaharlal Nehru and, later, Indira Gandhi saw that he was unselfish to the core, often taking the time to rally round the Congress party when it called for the support of the people in providing relief to victims of natural calamities.
The bonding between Rajni and Dilip Bhai was based on a shared ideology as admirers of Nehru. Both of them rejected all aspirations for political authority by not settling for elective politics. They could have won landslide victories and got voted into Parliament; instead, Dilip Bhai opted to back candidates like Krishna Menon in elections to give the Congress party its triumph in more than one general election. Their common goal was to serve the common man and empower people through education.
Very few people know that the Nehru Centre at Worli is Rajni’s and Dilip Bhai’s brainchild. They developed the concept and sought the support of the Central Government (Indira Gandhi was in power then during her first tenure in 1966?77). The Nehru Centre was conceived as a tribute to Jawaharlal Nehru and his vision of modern India. The architect was their common friend, I. M. Kadri.
Dilip Bhai has never confined himself to films and his profession as an actor. He is a voracious reader and takes a keen interest in Indian and Western performing arts and fine arts, with friends from all walks of life. And it was during these interactions that he realized the need for a multifaceted cultural centre. He had talks with all his friends from the world of classical music, dance and drama, friends who taught history, science, geography and modern literature, friends who were engaged in research projects and so on for their inputs. Since Rajni and Dilip Bhai had both read Nehru’s Discovery of India with keen interest, they were enthusiastic about having an entire section called Discovery of India.
On the day the foundation stone was laid for the Nehru Centre by Indira Gandhi in November 1972, there was a party at Rajni’s house, which was attended by a couple of close associates of Rajni and of course Dilip Bhai. It was my birthday and Rajni told me he was going to celebrate my birthday. I was there at the party as a colleague and friend of Rajni ? I was practising law then – and it was there that he disclosed his desire of marrying me to Dilip Bhai, who told him to go right ahead! And so Rajni proposed to me, adding that the marriage had to take place that night itself. I was naturally astounded a
nd no amount of reasoning could make him change his mind. It was nearing midnight and I had to call my bewildered parents to come over while the real challenge was to find a pandit to solemnize the marriage. Dilip Bhai told somebody in the group to go get a pandit from somewhere. At that unearthly hour they woke up a pandit living near the Babulnath Temple (in Bombay)! They brought the bleary eyed chap and woke up shopkeepers they knew to get the stuff required for the ceremony. The marriage was solemnized with Dilip Bhai showering his blessings on both of us as my elder brother.
PYARELAL *
SAHAB’S CLOTHES HAD TO BE LAUNDERED WITH CARE AS HE ONLY WORE white and he liked his cotton shirts to be starched just right and his collar absolutely crease-free.
In the vicinity of Sahab’s Pali Mala residence lived Abdul Bhai who gave Sahab his periodic hair cut. Abdul Bhai used to wonder aloud how Sahab’s hair grew so fast after every hair cut. And no matter how hard he tried to give a neat cut the hair got tousled over the forehead. He got irked when young men came to him at his saloon saying: ‘Hum ko Dilip Kumar ka style do’ (style our hair like Dilip Kumar’s). And they never believed him when he told them that he didn’t create that style – it just got done on its own as if by some magic.
Sahab spoke to me with a warm concern whenever he met me, asking about my family. He was a superstar and I remember his films running for a whole year at Bandra Talkies and how eagerly we awaited the release of his movies because he made only one film in a year. His fans would throng the road to his residence at Pali Mala and later at 48 Pali Hill. He never got irritated when they stopped his car at the gate of his house. He let them gaze at him and sometimes even talked to them for a few minutes.