Parveen Babi had the world had at her feet. Stunning in her beauty and a mind tormented by its brilliance she left us on this day twenty years ago. It wasn’t a pleasant death. She had by then lost touch with reality completely. Locked away in her apartment, not in touch with a single soul, she was convinced there were people out there who wanted to kill her.
Amitabh Bachchan never spoke about Parveen Babi’s death, except once and only to this writer.
When Parveen had passed away, Mr. Bachchan in an uncharacteristically candid moment spoke exclusively to me about her. Parveen Babi and Mr B worked together in several films – Majboor, Deewaar, Amar Akbar Anthony, Namak Halal, Shaan, Kaalia, Mahaan, Do Aur Do Paanch, Kala Patthar… He did the maximum number of films with Parveen after Jaya, followed by Raakhee and Rekha.
Mr. Bachchan was all praise for Parveen’s stardom. “Most of my films with Parveen were superbly successful. The audience liked us as a pair. She brought in a new, bohemian kind of leading lady to the screen. We’d work on all these films and go our own way. But because we belonged to the same social circle we’d visit each other, listen to music. She was a very fun-loving, light-hearted person. Always full of joie de vivre! She never interfered with anyone’s work. On the sets, you barely knew she was around. She completely minded her own business.”
Mr. Bachchan also spoke on Parveen’s mental condition. “What happened to her is sad. I feel very bad for her. We’d meet socially very often. We all belonged to one big group – Romesh Sharma, Danny Denzongpa, Reena Roy, Smita Patil, Javed Akhtar, Parveen. When I had my accident, they all would come to see me every single day. It was so nice of them. One never forgets the people who stick close to you at a time of crisis. I used to be very depressed then. In 1983, I took Parveen out for her first live show, and then suddenly she just disappeared!”
When I asked Mr. Bachchan what went wrong with this breathtakingly beautiful woman he refused to give an opinion. “I don’t know what happened. It wouldn’t be ethical to talk about her condition. The nature of her illness was such that she was terrified of people; she wanted to be left alone. She deliberately distanced herself from everyone. We felt by associating ourselves with her, we were causing her more grief.:
In Mr. Bachchan’s opinion, did Parveen make a difference to Hindi cinema? “Oh, certainly! She was one of the first Indians to be featured on the cover of Time magazine. She was very meticulous about her career. She had a very efficient management system. Her secretary and managers were very efficient. She lived all on her own and was very self-dependent. I sincerely feel she was a very genuine, honest, and down-to-earth person, very loving and caring. And that’s how I’d like to remember her.”
