Born: 15 September 1921, Raiwind, Pakistan
Died: 9 February 1989, Lahore, Pakistan
courtesy:http://upperstall.com/profile/meena-shorey/From being the heart throb of India (being known as the ‘Lara Lappa girl’ at her peak) to begging at a film function in the 1980s in Pakistan for money to marry off her sister’s daughters, Meena Shorey’s is the classic and tragic riches-to-rags story one often finds in the filmline.
She was born Khursheed Jehan, the second of four children, in Raiwind in a small rural household on November 15, 1921. Her father was based in Multan but due to his wayward ways, he lost whatever land the family owned. He tried his hand in the dyeing business in Lahore but that too failed and to make things worse for the family, he used to brutally beat his wife. Meena’s elder sister, Wazir Begum, married and shifted to Bombay and she got Meena and their mother to move there as well.
In Bombay, she accompanied her brother-in-law to the mahurat of Sohrab Modi’s Sikandar (1941). Modi, taken in by her beauty, offered her a supporting role in the film and bound her to a contract to work exclusively for him. He also gave her the name Meena. Sikandar did extremely well and Meena was on her way. Modi then cast her as the second lead in Phir Milenge (1942) and Prithvi Vallabh (1943). In the last named, she was paired opposite Al Nasir, whom she later married. The marriage did not last very long due to Nasir’s womanising ways. As it is, this was Meena’s second marriage. She was married to actor Zahur Raja in 1941 earlier.
Meena first met the Lahore based filmmaker Roop K Shorey, when he came to Bombay to look for a heroine for his forthcoming film, Shalimar (1946). Though he wanted Meena as the heroine of the film, Sohrab Modi’s rigid contract came in the way. According to Meena, the contract again prevented her from doing Mehboob Khan’s Humayun (1945) as well. Further, on a visit to Lahore, she met producer Dalsukh Pancholi, who signed her on for two films Shahar se Door (1946) and Arsi (1947). Immediately, Sohrab Modi took her to court asking for damages of Rs 3 lakhs. According to Meena, taking advantage of her illiteracy, Modi bound her for three years whereas the contract was supposed to be for a year only. She added that Modi then demanded Rs 60,000 to release her and seeking help from Modi’s wife, Mehtab, the matter was finally settled for Rs 30,000. Meena was now free. She returned to Lahore and fulfilled her contractual obligations by starring in Shahar Se Door and Arsi.
Meena hit the high point of her screen career with Roop K Shorey’s Ek Thi Larki (1949), co-starring Motilal. The film, a comedy thriller, looks at a girl (Meena) on the run after she witnesses a murder and shows a new facet of Meena exploring her comic talents, which were considerable. But above all it was the popularity of the song Lara Lappa Lara Lappa that was chiefly responsible for the film’s success. The song was hummed in every nook and corner of the country and as mentioned, Meena became known as the ‘Lara Lappa girl!’ She also got married to Roop K Shorey becoming Meena Shorey.
After Ek Thi Larki, Meena did a steady lot of movies, mostly with Roop K Shorey, but none measured up to Ek Thi Larki. Perhaps, the best of the lot was Ek Do Teen (1953) re-uniting the Shoreys with Motilal. By the mid 1950s though she was still doing the odd film or two every year, it was obvious her career was in decline.
At this point, the Shoreys were invited to come to Pakistan and make a film. The result was Miss 56 (1956), a whacky comedy film starring Meena Shorey, Santosh Kumar, Aslam Pervez, Shamim Ara, Zarif and Charlie with music by the great GA Chisti. The film, written by IS Johar, was a comedy centred on the heroine and depended heavily on Meena’s comic talents. Among other things, the film had her chasing the jeep-driving villains on a camel, besides mimicking a French lady with the help of a false nose and a huge wig! Though the film did just about average business, the adulation that Meena got on returning to Lahore was tremendous. She decided to relocate to Pakistan, even at the cost of her marriage.
Meena’s most successful film in Pakistan was Sarfarosh (1956) co-starring Sabiha Khanum and Santosh Kumar, which released before Miss 1956. According to Meena, she was signed on to play the lead role of a princess in the film, but later on Sabiha was given the role and Meena was asked to play the ‘lesser’ role of a bandit queen. She says she walked out of the film but on the pleading of the director, Anwar Kemal Pasha, and his father, she relented. Nevertheless, she still made a strong enough impact in the film and perhaps the best song in the film, Teri Ulfat Mein Sanam, sung by Zubaida Khanum was picturised on her. She also became the first Pakistani actress to model for Lux soap, thus becoming the ‘Lux Lady of Pakistan.’
However soon, even in Pakistan, with her subsequent films apart from Akhri Nishan (1958) making no real impression at the box office, she began getting supporting or negative roles and found herself getting sidelined. Though she made an impression in the odd Mousiqar (1962) as the vamp and Khamosh Raho (1964) playing the madam of a brothel, the roles were becoming a rarity and soon she found herself playing small character roles. A short-lived marriage to actor Asad, her co-star in Jamalo (1962), proved disastrous for her. Perhaps, among the last roles she made any sort of impact was in the Punjabi film Jigri Yaar (1967), her comedy track with Zeenat proving quite popular, and Humraz (1967), where she played a negative character of a governess. Thereafter, her roles amounted to little more than small cameos with her last screen appearance coming in the Shabnam-Waheed Murad starrer Nishani (1979).
Meena lived the last few years of her life in abject poverty in Pakistan. She had no savings and was reduced to living in a couple of rooms in Lahore’s Mohni Road. There was no one to look after her and she subsisted on a small stipend paid to her by the Pakistan Arts Council and sometimes the Rotary Club. It is said she compared herself to a dried up tree in a grove full of green young saplings that everyone was out to destroy and burn.
Meena Shorey died lonely and forgotten in 1989. Her burial was arranged with charity money and few came to attend her funeral
Meena Shorey was the silver screen temptress of the 40’s and the 50’s. Once the hippest girl in the Indian movie industry, she was born in Raiwind in a small rural household. Her father lived a wayward life and used to beat his wife brutally. One of Meena’s sisters married and moved to Bombay, and she and her mother followed. Sohrab Modi at the time was looking for a young girl who could play the lead in Sikandar (1941), Nasim, the most beautiful woman of her time, having walked out. Therefore, Sikander marked her debut, the memorable Sohrab Modi production starring Prithvi Raj as the world conqueror. Meena starred as the sister of Ambhi, the rajah of Taxila.The movie was an all-India hit and there was no looking back for Meena.
Eik Thi Ladki, made by her husband Roop K. Shorey in 1949 in Bombay, dubbed her as the sensational Lara Lappa Girl (after one of the popular songs from that film). Just when the glamour of this achievement was beginning to decline the couple was called to Lahore by J.C. Anand. He had used an Indian soundtrack (Hemant Kumar’s number Na Yeh chand ho ga) in his successful movie Sassi last year and now he wanted to improve the status of his plagiarism by imitating the concept of an entire film: Guru Dutt-Madhubala hit Mr. & Mrs. 55. What came out was Miss 56.
Although the film did good business, it proved to be the swan song of the Shoreys. Meena, the Lara Lappa Girl of the forties was pampered by all, in contrast with the treatment meted out to declining artistes by film-goers in Bombay. For her it was like rediscovering the adulation of her youth. So when the time came to return to India, she decided to stay back, leaving heart-broken Roop to take yet another trip from Lahore empty-handed, within a span of ten years, first losing his means of livelihood and then his sweetheart. That was the separation of the Shoreys. As time was to reveal, it did no good to any of them. Apart from a few side roles in major films like Sarfarosh (1956), Bedari (1957), and Mauseeqar (1962) she was soon reduced to obscure films with titles that sounded like Jagga (1958), Bacha Jhamoura (1959), Behrupiya (1960) and Jamalo (1962) before her ultimate descent into negative old-age role of a ‘Madam’ running a network of bonded prostitution in Khamosh Raho (1964).
The final part of her life story is almost too painful to be real. While Roop K. Shorey died in 1973 in India, from a broken heart over the separation from his sweetheart; Meena – the former wife of the studio owner and once a bright star in the galaxy of Bollywood was reduced to extremely destitute living by the end of her life before her death in 1989. None of her marriages, except the one with Roop K Shorey, brought her any happiness. One of her Pakistani husbands, the B-grade actor Asad Bokhari, used to beat her as if it were part of his husbandly duties. Once she mentioned that she felt like a dried up tree in a grove of green saplings that everyone is out to chop down and burn. She was last seen in the television program Silver Jubilee in 1983 and then mentioned in one news item as having had stood up in a function begging for charity money to marry off her sister’s daughters. Muhammad Ali, who had played a younger (and his first great) role against her in Khamosh Raho was reported to have given her moral support on that occasion. It is said that her burial was arranged with charity money – By Khurram Ali Shafique, Khalid Hassan and Ummer Siddique
Meena died on 9th Feb 1989
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