An Enigma called Parveen Babi by Karishma Upadhyay

Jasmine Sandhu Sandhawalia

Sensuous, glamorous and bold, Parveen Babi set Indian cinema ablaze, making the stereotypical nice-pious heroine take a backstage and catapulting the industry into an era of contemporary western fashion and style.

Parveen did not have one conservative bone. An only child born to a middle-aged mother and a much older father, she grew up in a haveli with 54 rooms. The aristocrat graduated from Ahmedabad’s St Xavier’s. In Sanjay Khan’s words, “Parveen read Richard Bach and could discuss Jean-Paul Sartre and existentialism; she was extremely extraordinary.” It was this extraordinary streak which made her fiercely independent, successful and erratic.

The epitome of brains and beauty, however, went through three decades of intense love affairs with intelligent, famous and “not so common men” — from Kabir Bedi, Danny, Bhatt, to the rumoured affair with Amitabh Bachchan. In times when it was all hush-hush, the bold and beautiful woman from Junagadh could speak about her personal life and the men who she loved at different stages with great elan, while hiding behind a veil of cigarette smoke.

In her quest to find a family, love and the elusive God, Parveen was not doomed to find solace in Kabir, Bhatt or Danny. The three buried her on January 30, 2005 to say a final goodbye.

Parveen lived with Danny in his apartment before they broke up after years. Then came the charming Kabir Bedi. They loved each other. Protima Bedi probably explained the enigma best in one line: “Parveen is a one-man woman.” However, she lost Kabir and had a tumultuous and intense relationship with Bhatt. “She whispered ‘I love you’; they were just three little words but the ache and anxiety in her voice betrayed how desperately she needed me to say those words to her. I did not,” Bhatt told the author Karishma Upadhyay. Parveen’s was a life full of colours without any real hue in them. What shone through were empty words, lonely nights and the need to find a protector.

Was Parveen looking for a lover, or a man who would be her mother and father? She was six when her father died. Her relationship with her mother was rocky. There were no siblings. She held on to the crumbs of human affection. A series of nervous breakdowns began, coupled with the obsession with Amitabh. Her first hiatus in Bollywood was shorter than her second. She left the country and lived in the US for years. With 56 movies and a career which saw huge ups and downs, Parveen Babi like her favourite author Richard Bach covered an expanse which no ordinary woman could have done.

The one constant though was loneliness. She was alone in life and in death. The only man she did not blame was Danny. The book is an excellent read, it flows like poetry.