The 1950s era belonged to Dilip Kumar, Raj Kapoor and Dev Anand. Down South the decade was ruled by MGR and NTR. Satyajit Ray became global news with Pather Panchali. This was a decade of path breaking filmmakers Mehboob Khan/ Mother India, K Asif/ Mughal–e–Azam, Bimal Roy/ Do Bigha Zameen, Guru Dutt/ Pyaasa, BR Chopra/ Naya Daur. Meena Kumari, Nargis, Madhubala, Vyjantimala were front runners’ heroines.
In 1961 it was not Shammi Kapoor but the entire country rejoicing with yahoo in Junglee. Shammi was the rebel star, Sunil Dutt the off-beat actor, Rajendra Kumar the jubilee star and Rajesh Khanna after Aaradhana. Hrishikesh Mukherjee, Ritwik Ghatak and Mrinal Sen were the new brigade directors taking forward the dream of Bimal Roy’s realistic cinema. Waheeda Rehman, Mala Sinha, Sadhana, Nanda, Asha Parekh, Sharmila Tagore were the fortunate heroines who starred in both Black &White and colour musicals.
The story continues…