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In recent years, the term superstar has been thrown around liberally. Any actor who achieved moderate mainstream success is quickly dubbed as a superstar, thanks to the press and eager publicists. However, there was a time when this label was reserved for the true giants of the film industry. Legends like Ashok Kumar, Dilip Kumar, Raj Kapoor were among Bollywood’s first superstars. Yet the women of the era weren’t far behind-one of them, the youngest of the lot, even came from a star-studded family. We are talking about none other than Nargis Dutt.
Born as Fatima Rashid on June 1, 1929, Nargis Dutt made her screen debut as a child artist in Talash E-Haq (1935) as Baby Nargis. She was the daughter of Jaddan Bai, a renowned Calcutta courtesan, a well-known actress of the early days of cinema, and one of the pioneers of the Indian film music.
In 1943, Nargis appeared in Mehboob Khan’s Taqdeer, opposite Motilal. The film was a big box office hit and made her an overnight star. She had her next breakthrough in 1949 when she appeared in Andaz and Barsaat. Both films were a superhit and became the highest-grossing films ever. Still only 19, Nargis became the biggest female star in the country.
At that time, Nargis even started charging more than male superstars like Raj Kapoor, Dilip Kumar, Dev Anand. She dominated the box office, delivering iconic blockbusters like Awaara, Shree 420 and Chori Chori alongside Raj Kapoor. In 1957, she starred in Mother India, which became the highest-grossing Indian film of its time and remains the only woman-led film to hold that record. The film was nominated for the Oscar but lost to Nights of Cabiria by a single vote.
Nargis holds the records of being the actress with most all-time blockbusters to her name. Remarkably, she achieved all this by the age of 29, after which she married her Mother India co-star Sunil Dutt and retired from acting.
At the age of 51, Nargis Dutt passed away as she was suffering from pancreatic cancer for a long time.
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