Love stories behind the Bollywood screen
By Neena Badhwar
Bollywood creates sensational stories based around one and only one human feeling, Love. Stories have been written, songs have been sung for ages in the name of love. Even the villain is actually in love in our movies with the heroine and tries in every vile way to get her, or her money, and gets battered to pieces by the macho hero who is out to tackle anyone who comes in the way of his beloved, beautiful heroine.
These stories not only happened on screen as they are actually the stories of common Indians but also among the stars behind the screens. There are scandals and the film magazines are littered with juicy tales of which readers are plenty in India and overseas.
Many such stories are etched in our memory. Remember Dev Anand and the beautiful Suraiyya. Not only was she beautiful she was the songstress of the forties and fifties film songs. ”˜Awaaz de kahan hain, duniya meri jawan hai’ ”“ Dev heard her when he entered film industry fell heads and over heal in love with Suraiyya. When he achieved a bit of stardom he went with a ring to get engaged to her and her furious grandmother Badshah Begum threw it into the sea in Bombay’s Marine Drive along with Dev out of her daughter’s life.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mLGCAGHNTJU
And what about Guru Dutt. Married to the memorable Geeta Dutt, he fell in love with beautiful Waheeda Rehman. Their movies together hold a classic appeal even till now if ever they are screened such as ”˜Kagaz Ke Phool’, ”˜Chauhndavi Ka Chand’. In 1956, Guru Dutt had launched a new find Waheeda Rehman in his directorial venture ”˜C.I.D’. Soon rumors started flying around the filmy circle that a romantic liaison between the doe-eyed beauty Waheeda and Guru Dutt had been ignited. The end result of this love triangle was destructive. While Guru Dutt committed suicide in1964, Geeta Dutt took her way out in drinking and died of liver cirrhosis in early 1970s.
Amitabh Bachchan and Rekha met on the set of movie ”˜Do Anjane’ in 1976 and fell head-over-heals for each other. Amitabh was a much married man by then, while Rekha was beginning her second-innings in bollywood with her revamped sexy image. It was said that Amitabh was keen on eloping with ”˜Madam R’ but his mother, the feisty Teji Bachchan held her son’s marital fort by supporting daughter-in-law Jaya Bachchan out-and-out. Rekha herself went through two torrid marriages in quick succession. But Even after 40 years, still when Amitji and Rekha grace Filmfair award functions or any such film party, their unspoken chemistry seems palpable.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XZ2k5ZjmLj8
Love makes a person do outrageous things, even conversion to different religion. When ”˜The He-man’ of bollywood Dharmendra first saw Hema Malini, he was married to Prakash Kaur and already father of 4 children with her. On the other hand, bollywood dream girl Hema Malini was the rising reigning queen of the Hindi film industry, sweeping heroes like Jitendra and Sanjeev Kumar off their feet with her beauty and appeal. When this delicate Tamil Brahmin girl fell in love with Dharmendra, it became the notorious love story of the decade. As Hindu marriage act prohibits a man to take more than one wife, both Hema and Dharmendra converted to Islam as Prakash Kaur refused to grant a divorce to her husband. By the way their names were Aisha Bi R. Chakravarty and Dilawar Khan Kewal Krishn when they married in islamic tradition.
If there had been any wild child of bollywood, then Parveen Babi was the one. Free-spirited, gutsy, bohemian Parveen was all these things and many more. Apart from the lustrous hair, killing body and glam-doll image she was also famous for breaking millions hearts with her torrid love affairs with bollywood leading men. Among them Kabir Bedi, Danny Dengzongpa were two memorable names. But Mahesh Bhatt stood out among the lover’s pool of Parveen with his wit, his intelligence and his marital status. The much-married Mahesh Bhatt was blown away by Parveen’s charm and swept her off her feet in 1977. They lived-together for quite some time until Parveen’s deadly Paranoid Schizophrenia crept in between them. The once-confident actress started behaving radically with the thought of persecution mania. Both Kabir Bedi and Danny did their best to help out Mahesh who stood rock-solid beside Parveen, while he left his wife and kid behind. Mahesh’s movie Arth with Shabana and Smita was based on this love story. Mahesh did everything within his capacity to protect Babi and even took her to spiritual leader UG Krishnamurthy for her healing process.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wz_1v4-CxAk
Unfortunately Sridevi has passed away recently as whole of India mourned her death, the love story of Sridevi and Boney Kapoor is full of passion, emotion and a saga of betrayal that cannot be overlooked. When Mona Kapoor, Boney’s first wife convinced her husband to give shelter to the struggling actress Sridevi in their Mumbai home, it changed the course of her life. Sridevi and Mona were close friends and Sri used to date super star Mithn Chakraborty during those days. Sri wanted long term commitment, marriage and public announcement from much-married Mithun which he refused to give. A furious Sridevi took revenge by hobnobbing with Boney that later grew into a passion play. Mona was conveniently left into the darkness till the news of Sridevi’s pregnancy with Boney Kapoor’s child broke out. A humiliated Mona left her marriage with two kids, Arjun and Anshula Kapoor, while Sridevi and Boney tied the knot in 1996.
Love triangles abound in the Bollywood city of stars who become close while shooting for films. At times they go sour too. Some cooked to sensationalise for the sake of publicity and some true love stories while others not so true. The most sour one that left a bad taste was of the Kangana Ranaut-Hrithik Roshan affair, as we all remember, if not then, will write a story on it later.
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