Remembering Nargis ji

Nargis was born on 1st June 1929 as Fatima Rashid to the Mohyal Brahmin. She was the daughter of Allahabad-based singer, Jaddanbai and Uttamchand Mohanchand. Her mother was a well-known dancer, singer, actor, composer, and director. This is what paved the way for Fatima to become a child artiste (Baby Nargis) as early as 1935.

Nargis appeared in numerous films after her debut; she won lasting fame for her later, adult, roles, starting with at the age of 14, in Mehboob Khan's Taqdeer in 1943 opposite, Motilal. She starred in many popular Hindi films of the late 1940s and 1950s such as Barsaat (1949), Andaz (1949), Awaara (1951), Deedar (1951), Shree 420 (1955), and Chori Chori (1956). She appeared in Mehboob Khan's Oscar-nominated rural drama Mother India in 1957 for which she won the Filmfare Best Actress Award for her performance. Baburao Patel of the film magazine Filmindia (December 1957) described Mother India as "the greatest picture produced in India" and wrote that no other actress would have been able to perform the role as well as Nargis.

Nargis and her movies, (approximately 50) which spanned from 1935 through on to 1967, continue to be popular even now.

Nargis, and Bollywood mega-star Raj Kapoor formed a reel romantic couple, but it is well known that they had an off-screen romance and intimate relationship as well. Raj, who was already married to Krishna, refused to divorce his wife. After playing the mother of Sunil Dutt, a Mohyal Brahmin also, from Jhelum, British India, in the movie 'Mother India', she subsequently married him on 11Mar 58.

After her marriage to Sunil Dutt in 1958, Nargis gave up her film career to settle down with her family, after her last few films were released. She made her last film appearance in the 1967 film Raat Aur Din. The film was well received and Nargis' performance as a woman, who suffers from multiple-personality disorder, was critically acclaimed. For this role she won a National Film Award for Best Actress and became the first actress to win in this category. She also received a Filmfare Best Actress Award nomination for this film.

In 2011, Rediff.com listed her as the greatest actress of all time, stating, "An actress with range, style, grace and an incredibly warm screen presence, Nargis is truly a leading lady to celebrate." M.L. Dhawan from The Tribune said, "In almost all her films Nargis created a woman who could be desired and deified. The charisma of Nargis's screen image lay in that it oscillated between the simple and the chic with equal ease."

The Indian actress Nargis made her only appearance in a Greek film in Tosa oneira stous dromous (1968). Her movies were popular in Greece.