Prakash Mehra, the film-maker who gave Indian cinema its ‘angry young man’ in the form of Amitabh Bachchan in Zanjeer, passed away on Sunday morning. He was 69. Mehra was battling a lung infection and was admitted at Kokilaben Dhirubhai Ambani hospital. He is survived by three sons, Amit, Sumeet and Puneet.

Mehra was a leading film-maker of the 70’s-80’s and is best known for his blockbuster films replete with dramatic stories, super hit dialogues, and haunting lyrics. He was born in Bijnor, Uttar Pradesh, in 1939 and started his career as a production controller in the late 50’s.

He ventured into filmmaking with the 1968 Shashi Kapoor starrrer Haseena Maan Jayegi, followed by the 1971 hit Mela, which had Feroz and Sanjay Khan in lead roles. But it was his first home production, Zanjeer that catapulted him into the big league.

His association with Bachchan is regarded as Bollywood’s best director-actor pair ever. After 1973’s Zanjeer, the duo scripted mega hits like Hera Pheri (1976), Muqaddar Ka Sikandar (1978), Laawaris (1981), Namak Halal (1982), Sharabi (1984). Their last film together, Jaadugar (1989), was a commercial disaster and it was believed that the duo had a fallout after the film. But Bachchan laid the rumour to rest when he recently visited Mehra in hospital.

In one of his blog posts, Bachchan had recounted, “Prakash Mehra, the director of some of my most significant and most successful films lies in the ICU. When I go up to him he has difficulty in recognising me. It is most depressing to see my contemporaries in this way... This wizard of a director, now lying inane and without response, eyes open but closed for all purposes, ventilator breathing for him — just so unimaginable.”

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