The timeless appeal of Meena Kumari

Ahead of her 50th death anniversary, Rajiv Vijayakar writes about the immortal works of Hindi cinema's Tragedy Queen

The legend of Meena Kumari lives on, though an incredible 50 years would have passed on March 31 since the iconic actress, also billed as the Tragedy Queen by some, achieved immortality. A frontrunner in fashion trends for Indian women of the times, Meena also modelled for several products.

Music label Saregama’s film department, Yoodlee Films, recently announced a web series on Meena’s swansong, ‘Pakeezah’, which aims to capture the love story between filmmaker Kamal Amrohi and Meena, his wife-cum-muse.

Who would have known then that the child Mahjabeen Bano, born to Ali Bux and his wife Iqbal Begum, both stage artistes also on the fringes of the film industry, would go on to act in over 90 films between (as child artiste) ‘Leather Face’ (1939) and ‘Gomti Ke Kinare’ (1972)?

Meena Kumari

As an actress nonpareil, Ashok Kumar, Dilip Kumar, Raj Kapoor, Rajendra Kumar and others have all opined that no one matched Meena’s intensity, the fire in her eyes and her effortlessness at both serious and light roles (‘Kohinoor’ and ‘Miss Mary’). Meena won immense praise for ‘Baiju Bawra’ (1952), ‘Parineeta’ (1953), ‘Sahib Biwi Aur Ghulam’ (1962) and ‘Kaajal’ (1965).

The story goes that her father had almost left her at an orphanage, as he had wanted a son. But he brought her back in hours, and at the age of six, Meena began working as a child artiste to support the family, beginning with Vijay Bhatt’s ‘Leather Face’.

Meena acted in over 15 films as a child actor. Her early films as leading lady includes mythologicals like ‘Shree Ganesh Mahima’ and ‘Veer Ghatotkach’, besides socials like ‘Bichchade Balam’ and ‘Piya Ghar Aja’. Her major break came with her mentor Vijay Bhatt’s musical ‘Baiju Bawra’, that got her recognition, both as actress and star.

Besides 17 films with Ashok Kumar, she did multiple movies with Dilip Kumar, Rajendra Kumar and Pradeep Kumar and worked with almost all the top heroes such as Raj Kapoor, Dev Anand, Shammi Kapoor, Guru Dutt, Balraj Sahni, Sunil Dutt, Raaj Kumar, Karan Dewan, Bharat Bhushan and Kishore Kumar.

Her youngest romantic co-star was Dharmendra, with whom she first worked in ‘Purnima’ (1965), ‘Main Bhi Ladki Hoon’ (1964) and the mega-hit ‘Phool Aur Patthar’ (1966). Dharmendra also became Meena’s emotional anchor during her turbulent days, when she had separated from Kamal Amrohi. While the popular notion is that the already-married Dharmendra exploited Meena to forge ahead in his career, the truth is that she needed him more, emotionally, than vice-versa, and the young actor helped fill her emotional vacuum.

The Meena-Kamal love story had begun in 1951 when she was involved in a car accident, and Kamal, then her producer, kept visiting her in hospital. The two got married in 1952 (Kamal was already married with three children) in a hush hush event. But eventually, after the news got out, Kamal’s first wife and children took to Meena’s loving and considerate ways.

In 1968, at Sunil Dutt’s insistence, and knowing that she was suffering from cirrhosis of the liver, Meena determinedly patched up with Kamal and revived ‘Pakeezah’, which had been launched in 1958. The film released on February 4, 1972, and remains among the less-than-handful of Hindi movies that were inordinately delayed yet became blockbusters.

Meena was self-educated as a child, getting no time to attend school, and was a bookworm on sets. Though largely typecast as a tragic persona
on-screen, her high proportion of hits was also attributed to her script sense that came from her penchant for reading.