Why Sunil Dutt considered R D Burman as the ‘lucky-mascot’ of Sanjay Dutt’s debut ‘Rocky’(1981) ?

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By Team Bollyy
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Why Sunil Dutt considered R D Burman as the ‘lucky-mascot’ of Sanjay Dutt’s debut ‘Rocky’(1981) ?

The musical-hit movie ‘Rocky’ (1981) just completed 40 years of its release while its debut hero Sanjay Dutt clocked in four decades of his acting career - Chaitanya Padukone
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This news cruised me on my flashback journey. It was on Thursday night May 7th 1981 at the star-studded glittering premiere of movie ‘Rocky’, held at the twin-theatres Ganga-Jamuna ( Tardeo-Mumbai).

Which I remember attending. It was a sad blend of glory and gloom. That’s because, just three days ago ( on May 3rd) Sanjay’s mother and dad Sunil Dutt’s legendary actress-wife Nargis Dutt had passed away due to a critical terminal ailment.

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The thoughtful Dutts had left a theatre-seat ‘vacant’ between debut-hero Sanjay and his eminent actor-director father Sunil Dutt at the film’s premiere in ‘late’ Nargis’ fond memory and ensured that ‘the-show-must-go-on’.

At the ‘Rocky’ 1981 theatre-premiere I could hardly get to speak to both Sanju-baba and Dutt-saab, as there were dozens of celebs all surging ahead to compliment the iconic father and star-son and express their condolences as well.

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Some years later, versatile star-actor and dignified gentleman Sunil Dutt ( who knew me personally as a journalist) was asked to honour me with an Award-trophy as an outstanding film-journalist at the Khar Gymkhana (Mumbai).

Then at the R D Burman-Asha Bhosle-Gulzar collaborated ‘Dil Padosi Hai’ (1987) album release party ‘chief guest’ Sunil Dutt-saab connected with me again.

There he shared with me, that he considered RD Burman as his “lucky mascot off-screen-hero” as his chartbusting songs ensured ‘Rocky’ a repeat-value for both ardent fans and audiences.

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The music-savvy Dutt-saab told me that he was so fond of RD that his hero Sanjay in movie 'Rocky' had his character-initials as "RD" (Rocky D’Souza) , because he considered RDB to be a lucky mascot.

Besides Sanjay, even Shakti Kapoor and Amjad Khan’s screen-characters were also having the initials of ‘RD” !

In fact Dutt-saab was to have got composer R D Burman to play himself as a cameo ‘screen-judge’ for the dance-competition in ‘Rocky.

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But it didn’t work out. So Shammi Kapoor was asked to play the cameo of ‘judge’ Besides the evergreen RDB-composed songs of 'Padosan', and his home-production 'Rocky', Sunil Dutt told me that he loved to listen to the soulful RDB-composed 'Ganeshotsav' song sung by Hariharan ....'Mere Man Mandir Mein Tu....' from his own film 'Dard Ka Rishta' (1982) .

Coming back now to Sanjay Dutt, isn’t it strange that like his debut-movie title ‘Rocky’ he has been literally facing ‘rocky’ and turbulent phases in his personal life and career but he has overcome the adverse odds to get going again.

Career-wise, Sanju-baba ( who was seen opposite Madhuri Dixit-Nene in ‘Kalank’ ) has a few upcoming film releases like 'KGF 2' alongside Yash, 'Shamshera' with Ranbir Kapoor, and 'Prithviraj' in the pipeline, The ‘Munnabhai’ movie series ‘boley toh’ macho-man actor also has 'Toolsidas Junior' lined up .

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