Sunil Dutt with Sanjay, Rhea, Priya and Namrata; A still from Munna Bhai MBBS

Roshmila Bhattacharya (MUMBAI MIRROR; May 25, 2019)

He was always Dutt saab for me. A real-life hero who had jumped into an inferno, raced towards his on-screen mother, then, as everyone watched with bated breath, had swept her up in his arms and made a dash back for safety. His spontaneous knight-in-shining-armour action had ensured that though bruised and slightly burnt, both Nargis ji and he lived to see another dawn. That incident which took place on the afternoon of March 1, 1957, in the village of Umra in Gujarat, on the sets of Mehboob Khan’s epic drama Mother India, is Bollywood history today.

Sunil Dutt saab and Nargis ji went on to quietly get married in an Arya Samaj ceremony the following year on March 11. The romantic in me loved the fact that in an era when cell-phones didn’t exist and traffic jams roadblocked you for hours, Dutt saab did not stir from his position outside the Arya Samaj Hall for three hours as he waited for the bride. Sitting in her car, Nargis ji was convinced her groom had left while he worried that if she turned up to find him gone even for a second, she might drive off. The marriage that happened close to midnight, was not expected to last even six months. It lasted 23 years till Nargis ji’s demise on May 3, 1981.

I met Dutt saab under trying conditions. Sanjay had been arrested under the Terrorist and Disruptive Activities (Prevention) Act (TADA), after being whisked off for questioning, minutes after he got off the plane on April 19, 1993. Dutt saab moved heaven and earth to get his son out of jail. On May 5, after Sanjay’s lawyers moved the High Court, he was granted bail. TADA was lifted, he was put under the Arms Act. There was a sigh of relief as Baba drove home to his Pali Hill bungalow past 9 pm the following day.

Sanjay however was still in Arthur Road Jail when I took a seat opposite Dutt saab at the same bungalow. He looked drained and admitted that he was in Germany, on his way to the US for a medical check-up, having undergone a bypass surgery just six months ago, when he heard that his son was in trouble over illegal possession of arms. By the time he reached London, the reports had got stronger. When his elder daughter Namrata got a call from Sanjay telling her to inform him that he wanted to return home from Mauritius where he was filming Aatish, Dutt saab didn’t think twice about booking himself on a flight back to Mumbai. “I knew he needed me,” he told me simply.

When Nargis ji was around, Sanjay had always been closer to his mother. By the time he lost her to cancer, he was heavily into drugs. Dutt saab didn’t work for three years as he tried to wean him away from drugs. “At that point of time he needed me. I stood by him. I made sure he got off drugs and his career started picking up. And I am still doing what I can… For my boy,” he told me that day, his elder daughter beside him, eyes tired from lack of sleep but spirit still strong.

After Sanjay returned home, I got a personal letter from him thanking me for all the support. A letter with a lot of heart that I still treasure.

Five years later, I spotted him at an award show. I was backstage when he strode past, fit and smiling. At the time of his death, on May 25, 2005, Dutt saab was a sprightly 75, Union Minister for Youth Affairs and Sports. He gave my locality in his Mumbai North-West constituency, a joggers’ track that still draws residents.

Last year, I saw Paresh Rawal play him in the Dutt biopic, Sanju. Dutt saab had himself returned to acting two years before he passed away in his sleep, as Sanjay’s reel-life father in Rajkumar Hirani’s 2003 film Munnabhai MBBS.

While discussing Sanju, Raju recalled that when they were shooting the last scene of his debut directorial, Dutt saab had a frozen shoulder and could not lift his arms to give Sanjay a proper hug. “Sanju whispered to me not to pressurise him,” Raju recounted. “Dutt saab heard him and told me not to worry, he would do the scene the way I wanted. And after a few painful tries, he finally gave Sanju a jadoo ki jhappi.”