Zindagi Ek Safar Hai Suhana ………..RIP Rajesh Khanna

The original super star of Bolloywood, albeit for a very brief period, is no more.     The fan-following and adulation, specially by females, which Rajesh Khanna has commanded in late 60s and early 70s was unprecedented and the title of Super Star was coined for the first time for him .   His romantic image was so predominant that every young girl of that era used to have his photo under her pillow and secretly wished to marry him  and many were reported to have got married to his photo itself and adore (a la Meera).  Stories were rife in those days that female fans used to write letters  dipped  in their blood, picking up the dust of the car in which he used to travel and  some young girls committing suicide after listening the news of his getting married to Dimple Kapadia.   Such a phenomena Rajesh Khanna was.       Some of the author backed roles by the then Bengali directors in films like Anand, Aradhana, Amar Prem, Aap ki Kasam, Namak Haraam,  Bawarchi, Kati Patang Daag, Do-Raste and Dushman, with fantastic music by SD/ R D Burman  and singing by Kishore, have catapulled him to super-stardom.    But a series of such hits, later on proved to be disadvantageous with pitfalls like type-casting, stereo typed acting  and over use of mannerism by tilting his head, blinking eyes with camera zoomed very close to his eyes, dialogue delivery which comes like a flow first and then put a sudden break to enable him to blink his eye and tilt his head.    At the peak of his career in early 70s the advent of action movies, thanks to the super duper hit of Zanjeer has seen the birth of another superstar Amithabh Bachan signalled the beginning of his end.     Zanjeer followed by Deewar, Sholay and Trishul establish Amitabh who scorched the screen with his angry young man image and with already established Dharmendra and the then upcoming Vinod Khanna being in the same mould of action has not helped the cause of Rajesh Khanna who has a soft, sober romantic image and/or a tragic image.    His flirting with action movies in Sacha Jhoota, Apna Desh, The Train and Roti have  gone unnoticed.   He never could adjust himself in multy-starrers of 1970s/80s which has promoted even average performers like Sashi Kapoor to stardom.   Come 1980s, Bollywood stars starting taking their dancing skills very seriously with jumping jack Jeetu followed by John Travolta and Michel Jackson's Clown our own Mithun becoming big hits as dancing stars.  Here too Rajesh khana had a disadvantage with having two left foot.  

At that time the only thing which could have saved his career was banking on south-indian remakes which had large number of family dramas with one man-two heroines stories, the super sacrificing elder brother, husband, village head-man etc which were originally done by ANR (who has on top bracket for over 50s years) and Shoban Babu (who was a popular star for over 40 years).    But to his misfortune, the mega record breaking Telugu hit film Prem Nagar (with ANR in Telugu and Shivaji Ganeshan in Tamil) when remade with him in Hindi (with a popular combination of Hema Malini and music by S D Burman)   bombed at the box office.      Few more South Indian remakes like Red Rose, Masterji also bombed at box office Apart from this set back, working in a South India set-up at that time (or even now) means to be highly disciplined, giving bulk dates and ensuring that the film was completed in record time of few months, but with larger than life image, undisciplined and cranky behavior has made him a non-preferred choice and the loss of Rajesh Khann has proved to be Jeetu’s gain who camped himself permanently in Hyderabad at the backyard of Annapurna, Rama Naidu and Padmalaya studios bagging almost all the Telugu remakes of 70s and 80s.   

Though his attempt to come back many times with Avataar, Swarg, Thodisi Bewafayi  and Souten met with modern success, he could never regain any of his past glory whatsoever.     His last movie which was like a semi-porno with an unknown C grade actress and his first and last TV commercial  for Havel fans given the fans more pain than pleasure and many might have wished why he doesn't learn to fade gracefully.     With the age he could not graduate into matured roles and also into the TV as has been done by every star worth his salt.   His disastrous marriage with Dimple Kapadia and negative publicity given for years together by the print media, has eroded his huge female fan following and proved to be the last straw on the camel’s back.

The tragedy with Rajesh Khanna, as he himself admitted in one of his interviews, that like Amitabh Bhachan, he did not have a Super Star before him to observe and take care of pitfalls of super stardom.    He allowed success go to his head and became super-arrogant and took the demi-God status bestowed by the fans too seriously.     As shown in the BBC film on him (a tribute in those days), when he came to know that he has not bagged filmfare award, he hosted a dinner on the same night as that of filmfare awards' night.      But he could not handle the fall from the grace and not adjusted and accommodated himself with changing times and hit the bottle in a big way leading to health complications.  The life and times of Rajesh Khann after that has become a manual for other stars who  followed him to realise how fickle and temporary the tinsel town stardom is and take care and we find most of the actors now-a-days are more sensible and organised.    

It is very sad that, unlike so many Ballywood stars, like Dev Anand, Raj Kumar, Rajendra Kumar and Raj Kapoor who played well within their own limitations and survived for a long time, Rajesh Khanna could not succeed in doing so and his stay at top was like an `Anar’  (flower-pot), very bright but for very short period.  

His captivating smile and innocent face (of Anand, Amar Prem and Bawarchi) will always remain etched in my memory .      Let’s celebrate his life rather than cry for him since as he famously said `I hate tears Pushpa’.

S. Prabhakar
18th July, 2012