A star fades away
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Parveen Babi was one of the top heroines for a decade. Like her relationships that soured, her date with fame also happened to be fleeting. Recently, the reclusive lady was found dead in her Mumbai apartment. V. GANGADHAR writes ...
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DRESSED IN a mini skirt and a top, which showed her cleavage, cigarette in hand, Parveen Babi was often seen at the Advance Cinema in Ahmedabad which screened English films.
A student of the local St. Xavier's College, Parveen dropped hints that she belonged to the royal family of the Junagadh State and also tried to compete with local idol, Mallika Sarabhai, who had the family name and fortune to back her. This writer first spoke to her at Rajkot when she was modelling for the Calico Mills `Dome' show, along with her boyfriend. "Modelling is fun," she said, "but one day I will be a film star in Mumbai." She did succeed and was one of thetop stars for about a decade. Life, however, was never easy for Parveen and recently, she was found dead in her Juhu flat, where she was living alone. She was 53.
It has been a life packed with incidents. Parveen was searching for something without knowing what it was. While doing the most stereotyped Bollywood roles, she developed intellectual pretensions and often quoted philosopher Jiddu Krishnamurthy and declared she was enamoured of the existentialist philosophy of the French writers Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert Camus. Such an attitude did not go well in Bollywood.
She was a discovery of director B. R. Isharra, who cast her as the heroine in the new wave film, "Charitra." Salim Durani, her co-star, was more comfortable wielding the cricket bat. But the industry took note of her good looks and the ease with which she carried her western outfits.
For 10 years, she was one of the top heroines, sought after by leading directors and was the co-star of popular heroes including Amitabh Bachchan.
She was pleasant in Hrishikesh Mukherjee's comedy, "Rang Bhirangi," but made no impression in "Eh Nazdeekiyan" with Marc Zuber. Parveen won no awards although in the mid-1970s she was featured on the cover of Time magazine, which did a story on Bollywood. If the films she did were boring, Parveen sought her excitement from real life, getting into a series of `beautiful' relationships with small time actor, Kabir Bedi, screen villain, Danny, and producer-director, Mahesh Bhat.
Flaunting these affairs, she observed, ``I cannot be a hypocrite, unlike the `sati savitris' of the Hindi films.'' Such quotes went down well with the gossip press of which the `Babi Baby' became a favourite.
The `beautiful' relationships soon soured ... particularly the one with Mahesh Bhat after he made a film on his affair and called it "Aarth." Parveen, perhaps, felt exploited and suddenly left for the U.S.
For years there was no trace of her, though rumours abounded about her being sighted at the Rajneesh township. Her return was as abrupt as her departure. But she had bloated and looked old and unkempt.
When she invited the media to her home, it was to complain about `international conspiracies,' to `finish her.' She blamed her co-stars including Bachchan as being part of the conspiracy. She even accused Sanjay Dutt of anti-national activities but refused the summons issued by the TADA court, which was trying him.
Bollywood slowly distanced itself from the once glamorous star. Naturally, the media could not publish such wild charges. Upset, Parveen constantly telephoned the editors for action. When one of them sent his film critic for an exclusive interview, she slammed the door on his face, claiming to be the maid. Obviously, she was no longer normal. She became a forgotten figure till the news of her death was reported to the police. Antony Gonsalves of "Amar, Akbar, Antony" has lost his Jenny.
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