Nargis-sunil Dutt : A Real Life Romance........ Options

[Reeth]

Nargis-Sunil Dutt: A real life romance

(As told to Shyam Bhatia in 2003)

Sunil Dutt's late wife, the famed actress Nargis, is part of his every waking hour; sometimes, she also
appears in his dreams.

He sees her in the eyes of his son, actor Sanjay Dutt, in the activities of the cancer foundation he has
established in her name, in the reels of the old films where they acted together and which he has
lovingly stored in the privacy of their Mumbai home....





Twenty-two years after Nargis lost her battle against cancer, Duttsaab, as he is known to millions of his
fans, opened his heart to tell rediff.com about one of Hindi cinema's greatest real life romances.

Asked if he married Nargis when she was on the rebound from her alleged affair with Raj Kapoor, Dutt
says simply, "I never knew there was a romance. The only thing I knew was that she came into my life.
I was not concerned about her past. I know these questions arise. But I am concerned about the
person who comes in my life; what matters from that day on is how true the person is to me. The past
is nothing to me."

The setting for our conversation is the luxurious Grosvenor House Hotel in Central London, where Dutt
is stopping over on his way back to Mumbai from a fund-raising trip in the United States.

Twenty-four hours earlier, when we met at a gala dinner, the 74-year-old actor-politician had agreed
to talk about his wife and family.

When Nargis and Sunil Dutt first met on the sets of Balraj Sahni's Do Bigha Zameen, he was a student
and an aspiring actor and she was already an established star. But they did not get married until
several years later, soon after they starred as mother and son in Mehboob Khan's 1957 classic,
Mother India.

"In my career I met so many movie stars, but starting a life together and building a home goes beyond
all other relationships," he explains. "I found in her a human being and a woman who would take care of
my family. I found in my wife both compassion and understanding.

"My sister had fallen ill and I was a raw guy; I didn't know any doctors in Bombay where I was then
working. Without telling me, she took my sister to a doctor and got her operated. I thought this is a
person who will make a better home for me and will do a lot of things for my family, which she did."

The two came from very different backgrounds. Dutt was the son of a Punjabi land-owning family who
lost their land to Pakistan and had to rebuild their lives and homes in independent India.

Nargis was the daughter of Jaddanbai, a Muslim thumri singer from Allahabad, and Mohan Babu, a
Hindu from Rawalpindi who never achieved his ambition of becoming a doctor.

Some memories of their life together, Dutt says, can never be forgotten. One of them was his wife's
unfulfilled ambition to be a doctor.

"My wife wanted to do what her father never finished; she wanted to become a doctor," he explains.
"But she was offered a job as an actress at a time when she was too young to decide for herself. Her
mother told her to try it and she shot up and became a very great star. But she always wanted to be a
doctor and that's why, even when she became a big star, she always used to go to hospitals, especially
cancer hospitals, to take care of the patients and meet them and meet the doctors."

It was ironic that when Nargis herself was stricken with cancer, the medical profession could do nothing
to save her.

At one point when she lay dying in a New York hospital, the doctors advised Dutt to switch off her life
support system because she had been in a coma for months; they warned she would only survive as a
vegetable.

He refused. To his amazement, she came out of her coma and seemed to recover. "Her brain scanning
was done, there was no damage, she had perfect memory," Dutt recalls. "The only thing she didn't
remember was how long she had been in coma and we never told her.

"When she recovered, she always told me I could afford to take her abroad for treatment but there
were many people in India who were dying of such illnesses because of lack of treatment. She said, 'If
I live, I will go and tell the prime minister that such help should be available to the poor people in every
state of our country'."

Fast forward to May 1981. This time, Nargis was dying. Son Sanjay's debut film, Rocky, was to be
released on May 7 and Nargis wanted to be present at the premiere.

"She told me, 'Whatever it is, even if you have to carry me on a stretcher or in a wheelchair, I want to
see the premiere of my son's movie'," Dutt recalls. "I made all the arrangements and had an ambulance,
stretcher and wheelchair. We kept a seat for her next to Sanjay. But she never made it. She died on
May 3...............

[myawan]

Thanks, twas interesting!

[Reeth]

Thanks, twas interesting!

Most welcome.....

[noorie]

Nargis-Sunil Dutt: A real life romance


Asked if he married Nargis when she was on the rebound from her alleged affair with Raj Kapoor, Dutt
says simply, "I never knew there was a romance. The only thing I knew was that she came into my life.
I was not concerned about her past. I know these questions arise.
But I am concerned about the person who comes in my life; what matters from that day on is how true the person is to me. The past is nothing to me."

That's a beautiful thing to say. I wonder how many of us can truly abide by it. I am not sure if I could ( at least not all the time ), and I am being very honest here.

Thanks Reeth 4 yet another heartwarming post.

Noorie

[Reeth]

Nargis-Sunil Dutt: A real life romance


Asked if he married Nargis when she was on the rebound from her alleged affair with Raj Kapoor, Dutt
says simply, "I never knew there was a romance. The only thing I knew was that she came into my life.
I was not concerned about her past. I know these questions arise.
But I am concerned about the person who comes in my life; what matters from that day on is how true the person is to me. The past is nothing to me."

That's a beautiful thing to say. I wonder how many of us can truly abide by it. I am not sure if I could ( at least not all the time ), and I am being very honest here.

Thanks Reeth 4 yet another heartwarming post.

Noorie

I felt the same way noorie , but that coupled with other qualities make Sunil Dutt a truly Great person