Her life script is perhaps more dramatic than the films on her resume. For someone, who created her own puppet theatre at the age of 10, young Kamini Kaushal herself became a puppet in the hands of destiny. She was barely in her 20s, and on the threshold of stardom when her sister passed away. She was asked to marry her brother-in-law. Young Kamini took on the responsibility of her bereaved nieces, thus silencing her dreams for the wellbeing of her family. And she honoured this commitment through the duskiest of phases. She even sacrificed her love for Dilip Kumar because she couldn’t ‘dump’ her husband and family to follow her heart. “I’d taken on the girls. I wouldn’t be able to show my face to my sister. My husband, a fine human being, understood why it happened. Everyone falls in love,” Kamini once confided in an interview with Filmfare. She didn’t allow the heartbreak to limit her life. She went with the drift, exploring motherhood, movies, writing, hosting TV shows and even turned producer. “If it doesn’t change, it’s not life,” she rightly says. What remains unchanged though is her desire to live fully. At 93, she impressed critics with her act as a discerning grandmother in Kabir Singh. Completing 75 years in the industry, it’s a game well played by Kamini Kaushal... Matinee Time
Daughter of famed botanist Professor SR Kashyap, Uma Kashyap was born in 1927. She was the youngest among two brothers and three sisters. A student of Kinnaird College in Lahore, the talented Uma did radio plays on Akashwani. Filmmaker Chetan Anand heard her on radio and charmed by her honeyed voice, offered her a lead role in Neecha Nagar (1946). Chetan Anand gave her the name Kamini because his wife was also called Uma (Anand) and was part of the film. Neecha Nagar was the first Indian film to be sent to the Cannes Festival. It won the Grand Prix Award, while Kamini Kaushal won an award at the Montreal Film Festival for her debut. In 1948, Kamini, barely in her 20s, was urged by her family to marry her brother-in-law BS Sood (chief engineer at the Bombay Port Trust) after her older sister, Usha, tragically died in a car accident leaving behind two girls Kumkum and Kavita. By then Kamini had already signed Raj Kapoor’s maiden production Aag and Gajanan Jagirdar’s Jail Yatra in 1947. “Raj was like an imp always thick on pranks. He’d say, ‘I am desi tharra (country liquor), you’re just a kid’,” she recalled in a Filmfare interview. Kamini did films with Ashok Kumar too including Poonam (1952), which she also produced and Night Club (1958). She worked with Dev Anand in Ziddi (1948) and Shair (1954). “Suraiya wanted me to pass on her letters to Dev. Her aunt would always be around. I felt sorry for them,” Kamini reminisced about the ill-fated Dev-Suraiya affair. With Dilip Kumar, Kamini gave hits including Shaheed (1948), Pugree, Nadiya Ke Paar, Shabnam (all in 1949) and Arzoo (1950). Her popularity soared with Filmistan’s Do Bhai (1947), aided by Geeta Roy’s track Mera sundar sapna. A film that won Kamini laurels was Bimal Roy’s Biraj Bahu (1954), based on Saratchandra Chattopadhyay’s novel. Her portrayal of a devoted wife won her the Filmfare Award. “I broke down several times while enacting the role. My character had a sense of righteousness. She believes her husband (Abhi Bhattacharya) would never dismiss her as unfaithful,” she told Filmfare. The film won the Golden Palm at Cannes. In Sohrab Modi’s Jailor (1958), Kamini played a wife pushed towards adultery by her husband’s insensitivity. Revered as an actor, Kamini’s name used to appear before the hero’s name in the credits, except in films with Ashok Kumar. Her fan base was huge. Once when the team of Poonam was travelling to Kolkata by train, a fan sneaked into her compartment, stole her pillow and left a note saying, “Agar aap ko takiyeki chori mein koi romance dikhai deta hai, to main aap ka chor premi hoon!”
The curve
Kamini moved to playing character roles with Manoj Kumar’s Shaheed (1965). “Manoj insisted on me playing his mother. I protested because I was only 40 and so tiny in front of him. But he made such a beautiful film!” says the actor who later played mother in all his films from Upkar, Purab Aur Paschim, Sanyasi, Shor, Roti Kapda Aur Makaan, Dus Numbari and Santosh. She also played sister-in-law to superstar Rajesh Khanna in Do Raaste (1969) and mother to him in Prem Nagar (1974) and Maha Chor (1976). Her bitter-sweet portrayal as Jaya Bhaduri’s mother-in-law in Uphar (1971) was also endearing. In the recent years, she was seen in Yash Raj Films’ Laaga Chunari Mein Daag (2007), Chennai Express (2013) and last year in the blockbuster Kabir Singh. As Shahid Kapoor’s 90-plus grandmother, who can understand the volatile Kabir, her short but sensitive act in Kabir Singh, won her a Filmfare nomination. Her dialogue, “Suffering is very personal. Let him suffer!” was a watershed moment.
Heartbreak
An intriguing chapter of Kamini’s life remains her sudden marriage to brother-in-law BS Sood, something she did ‘for duty, not love’ as summed by son Rahul Sood in a Filmfare interview. Kamini too had commented on the sudden turn in her life saying, “I loved my sister deeply. I feared my nieces, who were just around two and three, would flounder without a mother… It seemed an ideal solution. It was not a sacrifice. More so, my husband was a genteel and decent human being.” The couple went on to have three sons Rahul, Vidur and Shravan.
The marriage survived despite undergoing an upheaval – her reported romance with Dilip Kumar. The thespian too has mentioned in his biography that he was ‘shattered’ with the parting. Kamini reiterated that when she spoke to Filmfare, “We were both shattered. We were very happy with each other. We shared a great rapport. But that’s life. I can’t dump people and say ‘Enough now, I’m going!’ I had taken on the girls. I wouldn’t be able to show my face to my sister. My husband, a fine human being, understood why it happened. Everyone falls in love.”
A few years ago, Kamini happened to meet Dilip Kumar at an event but time and age had taken its toll by then. “He didn’t recognise me. I was heartbroken. It broke my heart to see him give me a blank look. He looked at me and I looked at him. He finds it hard to recognise anyone. I felt sad. What an era we have been through!” she told Filmfare.
Beyond films
Kamini was never the usual heroine obsessed with vanity or ‘catfights’ as she put it. In her free time, she wrote stories for the children’s magazine Paraag. In the late ’70s, she chaired the Children Film Society. She also did a number of TV serials for kids on Doordarshan including Khel Khilone. She went on to host puppet-based TV programmes like Chand Sitare, Chaat Pani and Chandamama, under her banner Gudia Ghar Productions (1989 to 1991). She made the puppets herself and modulated her voice to suit the different characters. “Puppets have soul,” she said describing her equation with her dolls. Her act as Aunt Shalini in the British TV serial, The Jewel In The Crown (1984), was much loved as those back home in Shanno Ki Shaadi and Waqt Ki Raftaar. At 90-plus, the veteran hit the headlines for her applause-worthy act in Kabir Singh. Otherwise, she enjoys her quiet time in her penthouse in Malabar Hill. A lush terrace, festooned with jasmine and bougainvillea, the verdant trees around it home to chatty birds that befriend her from dawn to dusk...it’s a beautiful autumn.
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