ANIL KAPOOR BIRTHDAY SPECIAL: WAQT NE KABHI JINSE BEWAFAAI NAHI KI.....Ali Peter John

He was like any other boy from a middle-class family in the then Bombay in the faraway suburb of Chembur and studied in a convent school, but had a very strong leaning towards Hindi films as his father Surinder Kapoor was a secretary of both Shammi Kapoor and his wife Geeta Bali and who later produced the film with Dara Singh and Rishi Kapoor and gave Mithoon Chakraborty a bit role in a film called “Phool Khile Hai Gulshan Gulshan”.

Anil was strongly influenced by Raj Kapoor in whose RK Studios he spent most of his time watching Raj Kapoor and other stars and filmmakers shoot, he had made up his mind that he too would be a star and an entertainer one day.

Anil Kapoor's elder brother, Boney Kapoor had started working as an assistant director with big filmmakers like Shakti Samanta and when Boney saw that his father’s banner was not doing well, he took courage in his hands and launched Narsimha Enterprises and started an unusual film called “Hum Paanch” with some of the best actors of the time and with Bapu, a renowned director from the South at the helm of affairs.

The young and ambitious Anil joined Boney in his adventure to make “Hum Paanch”. Boney decided to build a sprawling set of an entire village in a village called Melkote in the Manpya district several kilometers away from Bangalore, the set included air-conditioned rooms for all the stars and STD facilities to keep them connected with their families as there were no mobiles, no internet, and no social media those days, Boney’s set became the talk of the industry.

And the one man all the stars, technicians and even the spot boys talked about was the handsome brother of Boney Kapoor, Anil Kapoor, who did not shy away from bringing any kind of work if it helped the film and if he could help his brother in fulfilling his ambition.

And if there was one man who was keeping a very close eye on Anil, it was the director, Bapu, who saw in him a future star and finally told Boney about what he thought about Anil and Boney gave him the go-ahead sign Bapu signed Anil as the hero of a Kannada film.

After the Kannada film, the same Bapu showed how much faith he had in Anil when he directed him in “Woh Saat Din” and Anil showed what a fine actor he could be even if the face of competition from actors like Naseeruddin Shah, Padmini Kolhapure and Neelu Phule…

That was the beginning of one of the most successful stories of an actor who has never taken things lying down and who has never left any step, stone or rock unclimbed to reach the goals he wants to and be the happiest man and actor when he’s told and reminded that he has still a very long way to t reach anywhere near his goal.

Today Anil Kapoor is not only a star known in India, he made sure that he was a star and an actor known all over the world with Danny Boyle's “Slumdog Millionaire” and his TV serial “24″ which he produced in India.

Anil kapoorAnil once said that he goes mad when he is challenged by a role and I think it is this absolute madness that has kept him rocksteady even at sixty-four with not even a hair on his head touched and his body still ramrod erect, striding and facing the world like a general.

And there has to be a method in the madness of this general, he has never been known for any of the crazy controversies other stars are involved in, and he is never known to have affairs with other women, except for the one affair of his life with his wife Sunita, with whom they have their three children, Sonam, Riya, and Harshvardhan.

Anil Kapoor Productions is one of the most respected banners, a status that gained in less than a decade, a status deserved because of the madness and the passion of the man behind it. 

Happy birthday, madman, who I will always remember as a boy who served me endless glasses of tipping hot glasses of tea in Melkote.

Tags: anil-kapoor | birthday-special

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