date of birth:- 29 December 1942, Amritsar, Punjab, British India (now India) date of death:- 18 July 2012, Mumbai, Maharashtra, India (cancer)
Rajesh Khanna, the superstar of Indian Cinema, entered Hindi films in the latter half of the 1960s and did 180 films - 163 feature films and 17 short films. By 2011, he held record for maximum number of films as the solo lead hero and least number of mult
i star cast films in Hindi Cinema. He first tasted success with hit films like Baharoan Ke Sapne, Raaz and Aurat and he was appreciated for his performances in Aakhri Khat.Rajesh Khanna achieved super-stardom with Shakti Samantha's 'Aradhana" (1969).He became the craze of the nation, and critics across India started calling him the First Superstar of both Indian Cinema (No. 1 Actor) and Hindi Films and remained so alone as the Superstar for 7 years (1969-1975) and had to share the status with Amitabh from 1977-1991 till he left films to join politics in 1991.He overtook his predecessors Dev-Dilip-Raj, Shammi Kapoor,Rajendra Kumar in terms of popularity with audience and critics, quality of performances, variety of films by doing quickly 41 films in 9 years which included 35 Golden Jubilee Hits and 2 silver silver jubilee hits from 1966-1975. He also made the world record of having 17 successive super-hits in 3 years from 1969-71 which included 15 consecutive solo super-hit films. The main difference between him and his predecessors,successors, contemporaries was that Khanna's films ran successfully in whole of India and not just Hindi speaking areas and he did films of every genre simultaneously and has more critically acclaimed films to his credit than all other Hindi Actors of every generation. He stands out even by selection of his films as he regularly did both offbeat alternate cinema along with commercial potboiler films and had success in both.He introduced intelligent cinema to the masses with ease. Anju Mahendru was his girl friend in 1966-1972, the then aspiring actress but they had breakup in 1972 when Anju was not ready for marriage and Khanna married his fan Dimple Kapadia in March 1973, 8 months before Raj Kapoor's Bobby released in theaters. Khanna's pairing with Mumtaz always produced much success as they had all of their 8 films together as major platinum jubilee hits.His films with Sharmila Tagore, Asha Parekh and Zeenat Aman was a favorite with audiences too in 70's. From 1976 onwards till 1978, he had 4 box office hits and 9 films flopped unexpectedly although his performances and the film's music were praised by critics and thereby his successful run at the box office ended. Khanna bounced back with Amardeep and then again started giving many critically acclaimed and commercially successful films including 35 Golden Jubilee Hits and 16 SJH starting from 1979 till 1991. K.Balaji wanted to establish himself in Hindi film industry as a producer and thereby wanted to remake his Tamil film Sivaji Ganeshan starer Dheepam in Hindi. At a time when Khanna's films were not working at the box office, Khanna got this film out of the blue and went on to become a big hit.In the 80's his films opposite Tina Munim, Hema Malini, Reena Roy, Shabana Azmi, Smita Patil and Poonam Dhillon were big hits. He left film industry in 1991 and entered politics by joining the Congress Party in 1991 and became a member of parliament. Khanna was awarded Filmfare Special award in 1991 for having starred in 101 films as the solo lead hero and just 21 two hero films having appeared in 153 films in short span of 25 years. He is still adored and fondly remembered by the masses. Songs from his films adorn the lips of youth and adolescents. He was the first mega-star and has left behind a storehouse of the finest moments in film history.
