Meena Kumari

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orn her father had no money to pay the hospital bill and in frustration, he threw Meena at an orphanage but later when his wife insisted he brought her back home. How abandoned Meena becomes instrumental in supporting her family. Ironically Meena’s father who had abandoned Meena later loved her a great deal because it was young Meena who helped the family to survive by working in films as a child artist under the name Baby Meena. Meena’s father was a Music Director at a Parsi theatre and had failed miserably to make it big in Bollywood hence he experimented with all his daughters, Khursheed, Madhuri and Mahjabeen into films to fulfill his uncherished dreams. But none could succeed except Mahjabeen aka Meena Kumari. Thus at the tender age of six, when other children of her age played carefree, little Meena was put under the harsh glare of studio lights and became instrumental in supporting her family. Meena Kumari won two consecutive Filmfare awards Mahjabeen – caught the attention of filmmaker – Vijay Bhatt – who introduced her in his movie – ‘Leather Face’ (1938) as a child artist giving her a new ‘screen name’ as – Baby Meena – From ‘Leather Face’ to ‘Baiju Bawra’ it took 14 long years for Meena Kumari to come into limelight. After the phenomenal success of ‘Baiju Bawra’ she did Bimal Roy’s Parineeta. In this movie with her natural performance, she introduced a ‘new era’ in the acting department of Indian cinema – where histrionics took over glamour as epitomized earlier by such supreme beauties of the ’30s & ’40s like Devika Rani Naseem Banu, Veena, Jayshree etc. What’s more for both Baiju Bawra (1954) and Parineeta (1955) she won the prestigious Filmfare award in the Best Actress category for two consecutive years. Tug of war between Meena Kumari and Nargis In the late 50s when Meena Kumari was dominating Indian Cinema with her acting prowess another actress Nargis gave her a tough fight with her brilliant performance in Mother India (1957). However the same year Meena Kumari too stunned both film critics and the audience with her bold and daring performance in L.V.Prasad’s strange social drama – Sharada, in which 24-year-old Meena Kumari played the role of Raj Kapoor’s MOTHER!!! It was such an unconventional role that none of the top actresses dared to do but Meena Kumari took the challenge and came out with flying colors. Thus there was a great tug–of–war between Nargis and Meena Kumari for the coveted Filmfare Best Actress award. When D-Day came everybody awaited the Best Actress award with bated breath and thumping hearts. And when the name of Nargis was announced for her larger-than-life performance in Mother India, there was a mixed reaction. Particularly the film critics were deeply hurt as they felt Meena Kumari’s electrifying performance was ‘better’ of the two. Hence in the annual Bengal Journalist Association Award, the film critics awarded Meena Kumari as Best Actress. Few know that even the Filmfare jury was in dilemma and there was a division among the jury. A section had even recommended a ‘Special Acting award’ for Meena Kumari but it did not happen.

When Meena Kumari created the Filmfare record – Becomes the only actress to be nominated that year! After her rebellious outbreak from Kamal Amrohi, Meena Kumari took to heavy drinking and poetry to solace herself. In Guru Dutt’s ‘Sahib Bibi Aur Ghulam’ Meena Kumari made her loneliness hauntingly vivid. She poured out all her hidden emotions so convincingly that her evocative portrayal of the suffering women struck a responsive chord in Millions of women. For ‘Sahib Bibi Aur Ghulam’ she deservedly won the Best Actress award. In fact that year she made a kind of history, as she was the only actress to be nominated that year - the other two nominations were for her performance in ‘Aarti’ and ‘Main Chup Rahungi’. After this Meena Kumari went from strength to strength representing a traditional woman who was divested of all its physical antecedents with movies like Dil Apna Aur Preet Parai, Dil Ek Mandir, Chirag Kahan Roshni Kahan, Bhabhi Ki Chudiyan, Kaajal etc. While she won loads of laurels for her emotional roles few recognized her mastery in lighter roles where she effortlessly matched with the comic of genius, Kishore Kumar, in movies like – ‘Shararat’ and ‘Ilzaam’. Further her performance with Dilip Kumar in ‘Azaad’ & ‘Kohinoor’ proved beyond doubt that the great tragedienne of Indian Cinema was equally adept in comedies too!