More Romantic Than Fiction

As Kishwar Desai remarks in Darlingji, an account of the extraordinary relationship of Nargis and Sunil Dutt, some sceptics assumed that it was star and showman Raj Kapoor who remained the great love of Nargis’s life, and that she married the less successful Sunil on the rebound; or that Sunil was marrying Nargis for her star status. Typical reactions to a choice made by a successful woman — and Nargis was, after all, the daughter and granddaughter of strong-willed women who made their own choices in matters of profession and relationships. Her grandmother, Dilipa Devi, a Brahmin widow at 13, went on to make a life as a gaanewali, living with a Muslim musician. Dilipa’s daughter Jaddanbai became a successful singer, entered the then new field of the cinema, and moved to Bombay where she began to make her own films. Soon Jaddanbai’s apartment in Chateau Marine on the famous Marine Drive became a hub for film people.

And Darlingji is really the story of this intelligent, affectionate and altogether remarkable woman. In the course of her career, Nargis would play both the westernised woman and the conventional Bharatiya nari, but her iconic role would be Radha in Mother India. In her life after cinema, she would involve herself in meaningful social work, a tradition that Sunil would continue after her death (the Nargis Dutt Critical Care Centre at the Tata Memorial Hospital, Mumbai, a project of the Nargis Dutt Memorial Foundation, has benefited innumerable cancer...