Biographer Meena Iyer on the many contradictions of the star who never said anything off-the-record, and yet remained deeply private
Meena Iyer (MUMBAI MIRROR; May 1, 2020)

What can I write about Chintu (Rishi Kapoor) without letting him down? He was a private person. All the blabber on Twitter — which frequently struck as relevant and sometimes drew flak for its candour — was still just the tip of the iceberg. Ranbir Kapoor, when asked about his father’s social media presence, is quoted as saying in my book, Khullam Khulla: Rishi Kapoor Uncensored, “I do not have a take on his Twitter personality, though that is usually the first question anyone asks me about my father. All I can say is, so long as he is being honest and having fun, it’s his prerogative.”

I digress. But Rishi really was buried somewhere deep within the public persona, and few people were allowed to see that side of him. Most of the things I learnt about him were gauged and gathered from whispers, things he would speak about in private. Like his love and respect for his wife, Neetu, a no-tolerance policy towards certain colleagues, his love and admiration for Ranbir, and the urge to indulge daughter Riddhima and granddaughter Samaira.

He was fiercely protective of his family. Anything aimed at his siblings, parents, wife or son would hurt him. He wouldn’t bother about himself as much. Besides being a superstar, Rishi was a well-meaning father and a great companion to Neetu.

There were many highs and lows in the 40 years that we knew each other. In the early days, I recall meeting him as a cub reporter from Star & Style, sent over by senior colleagues to broker peace between him and the magazine. Rishi had been seething over something one of the columnists had written about his family. Oh boy, did I get an earful! Soon, he realised that I was just the messenger and cooled off. That was the beginning of our friendship. Chintu never asked me to keep things “off the record” and I loved that about him.

He had no patience for stupidity, especially towards the end. Perhaps, he knew that time was running out. Sometimes, I could see him exasperated by inane pleasantries. But he rarely brought up his illness with me. When my publisher asked me to do a reprint of our book, with an additional chapter on his battle with cancer, he flatly refused. “I don’t think there is any merit in it,” he said. Instead, he wanted me to do a book with Neetu on how she got through the difficult phase. “Ask her about our one year in New York.

Ask her how she brought me back from the brink. She’s the hero,” Chintu said. Some meetings with Chintu stayed in mind more than others. Like the time he returned from Mauritius in June, 2018, and we went to watch Sanju in Worli. He couldn’t stop raving about Ranbir’s performance in the film. Pouring us drinks at his house later, he thumped his chest, exclaiming that Ranbir had “surpassed” him and Neetu as an actor. When he couldn’t get through to Ranbir (the actor was rehearsing for a film elsewhere) he impatiently dialled Sanjay Dutt, who was overseas, to tell him that Ranbir had done him justice. Then, he turned around to explain, “Ranbir will call me back but I had to share my excitement with someone. Who better than the real Sanju?”

Our last meeting was on March 9, at his residence. He and Neetu had just retired to their fifth-floor apartment after participating in a Holi function. “Let’s hope all the negativity is gone in that fire,” Neetu remarked, while Chintu and I had a quick drink. He was faithful to his Johnny Walker Black Label but opened a Hibiki for me.

As Neetu and he reclined in their individual lazy-boys that evening, everything seemed normal. We watched old Hindi songs on TV and each time he, Raj Kapoor, Neetu or Randhir Kapoor appeared on the screen, Chintu would rattle off tit bits about the song. “This is my favourite pastime. I love the nostalgia it brings,” he’d confess.

At the dinner table, he reprimanded me for the umpteenth time for being a “boring” vegetarian, as he tucked into an extra-small portion of an exotic chicken dish whipped up by Neetu. That evening, I learnt that the couple and Ranbir were likely to celebrate Alia Bhatt’s birthday (March 15) together. Though he was in the middle of chemotherapy, Chintu told Neetu that he wanted to take his son and Alia out for a meal.

Later, he said to me that he would be okay if Ranbir wanted an intimate wedding. “It’s their call. I am okay with 45-odd people too. I will tell my friends, well-wishers to bless them. I will apologise and explain that everyone couldn’t be invited because Ranbir is a private person. I respect his privacy,” he said.

As I got up to leave, he apologised for not seeing me to the door and requested Neetu to walk me to the lift. Like always, a box of See’s Candies (sugar-free peanut brittle) was my parting gift. Now, I see the box staring back at me from the refrigerator. But the man who made sure I was always stocked up is gone.

Avijit Ghosh (THE TIMES OF INDIA; May 1, 2020)

Rishi Kapoor, who stormed into young hearts and stardom with the bubblegum blockbuster Bobby (1973), and who reinvented himself in the new millennium, deftly navigating fluctuating popular trends and fickle public taste, passed away in a Mumbai hospital on Thursday.

The actor, who was batting leukemia, was 67. “He remained jovial and determined to live to the fullest right through two years of treatment across two continents,” his family said in a statement.

Rishi, the second son of Indian cinema’s legendary showman Raj Kapoor, arrived at a time when Rajesh Khanna’s reign of romance was fast on the fade. Amitabh Bachchan and action were the new box-office currency. With his chocolate looks and red lips, he appeared to be on the wrong side of vogue. But Rishi didn’t fight the tide; rather he found ways to survive and thrive.

In a career spanning nearly five decades, he starred in over 150 films, forming a trendy romantic pair with Neetu Singh, who later became his wife. He was also part of many hits with Bachchan.
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Krishna Raj Kapoor With her hubby and sons — Rishi, Rajiv and Randhir Kapoor

Meena Iyer (DNA; October 2, 2018)

On Monday morning, the Hindi film fraternity woke up to the extremely sad news of Krishna Raj Kapoor’s demise. I will always remember her as the First Lady of Bollywood. It was her elder son, Randhir, who said, “I regret to announce that I lost my mother early this morning. She died peacefully.” The wife of Padma Bhushan recipient and Dabasaheb Phalke awardee, filmmaker Raj Kapoor, Krishnaji (88) died of a cardiac arrest at 5 am on October 1, 30 years after she lost her husband on June 2, 1988.

Krishna Raj Kapoor with husband Raj Kapoor

While friends and family members poured in to pay their last tributes, her son Rishi, who left for the US with Neetu and Ranbir on Saturday, couldn’t be present for the last rites. Speaking of Krishnaji, well, a hundred memories live with me. From her immaculate, usually, clad-in-white appearance to her bright lipstick and well-manicured painted nails, almost everything is etched vividly in my mind. Apart from being a benevolent human being, she was also extraordinarily sharp.
On one of my visits to her Deonar residence two years ago, I bent to touch her feet and she reprimanded me saying, “Betiyaan, pair nahin chhooti.” Yes, the Punjabis do not permit their daughters to touch the feet of elders because they feel a girl should never have to ‘bend’ as they are considered Goddesses. So, while Rishi Kapoor, with whom I had gone to their family home, touched his mum’s feet and got blessed in turn, I got a hug from the lady.

Next, we were treated to a glass of chaas. And, then asked to go about our business. We were picking out photographs for Rishi’s autobiography, Khullam Khulla. And, Krishnaji had kindly given us access to the treasure trove of family albums spanning seven decades that are lying safe in aluminium trunks on the bungalow’s first floor.

Krishna Raj Kapoor with Raj Kapoor and a young Rishi

At lunchtime, the lady of the house appeared dressed in a dark-coloured salwar kameez, her sartorial choice a rare exception. When we requested her for a photograph, she promptly pulled out her orange lipstick, dabbed her lips and said, “I’m ready.” Like the rest of her khandaan, she didn’t relish the fact that I was a vegetarian because the choices for a herbivorous person are limited at the Kapoor lunch table. Once that hurdle was crossed, she enthusiastically fed me aloo-gobhi and garam parathas, explaining how the cauliflower was broken into pieces, not cut in the Kapoor family kitchen. Minutes later, she saw Chintu eating without wearing a napkin. She wrinkled her nose and said, “Napkin pehen loh.” It was sweet to see a 64-year-old Rishi (in 2016) being pulled up by his mother for his lack of table manners on that occasion.
Like I said at the start, Krishnaji was her own person. She didn’t suffer fools and though the world believed that she lived in her legendary husband Raj Kapoor’s shadow, this was not true.

In his book, Chintu spoke so affectionately of his mother. He said, “When my dad wanted to cast me as the young Raju in Mera Naam Joker (1970), he had to take permission from my mother, who gave him the go-ahead with a caveat saying — it should not interfere with my school studies.”

Not many may know this. Chembur would not have been the destination for the famed RK Studios that came up on a barren plot of land there seven decades ago. Bollywood’s showman wanted the studio to be built at Tardeo back in the day. Legend has it that when Krishna heard that Raj saab had a choice of choosing between Tardeo and Chembur, she promptly told him to choose the latter. The reason, according to the family grapevine, is that Nargis had a home in South Mumbai and Krishna didn’t want anything too close to her place as she was romantically involved with Raj for many years.

Krishna Raj Kapoor with Raj Kapoor and Prithviraj Kapoor

It is also a legendary tale that when Krishna learnt of Raj saab’s reported involvement with Vyjayanthimala, she walked out of her home with her children and headed to Natraj Hotel in South Mumbai. Raj later bought his estranged family a home in another location but, eventually, Prithviraj Kapoor intervened and the domestic squabble was sorted. Yet years later, Krishnaji had matured and mellowed. She was a changed person altogether. Rishi also recalled how, when Nargis set foot in the R K Studios compound after 36 years, in January 1980 on the occasion of his marriage to Neetu Singh, she was nervous. But it is said that Krishna took her aside and put her at ease saying, “My husband is a handsome man. He is also a romantic. I can understand the attraction. I know what you are thinking, but please don’t beat yourself up over the past. You have come to my home and I cannot tell you how happy I am.”
Neetu Kapoor, who spoke to her mother-in-law every single day after her marriage until the very end, addresses her as her most favourite person in the world. Mrs Kapoor made a few daily calls. Besides Rishi and Neetu, Amitabh Bachchan, whose daughter Shweta is married to Krishna’s grandson, Nikhil Nanda, used to chat with her almost daily when he was in Mumbai. Big B always made it a point to inquire about her health and she, in turn, told him details of her failing health and she blessed him.

When Neetu turned 60 on July 8 and was heading to Paris for the celebrations, her only wish was that her ma-in-law should accompany her! Here in Mumbai, too, the saas-bahu had a fixed routine. Krishnaji and Neetu usually frequented a Chinese restaurant at a five-star in BKC. Besides eating there, the senior Mrs Kapoor would also carry a parcel of their signature Peking Duck back with her to Deonar to share it with her other two sons — Randhir and Rajiv — who spent time with her at the bungalow.

Krishna Kapoor, Dev Anand and Rishi Kapoor

There are innumerable stories about the senior Mrs Kapoor, but one of my favourite ones is the one where she called Rishi and Neetu on New Year’s Eve last year to ask them about their plans. “We are listening to Shirdi Sai Baba bhajans,” said Neetu because both Chintu and she had stopped going out on NYE for a few years now. To which the matriarch of the khandaan told her, “I am out in Khandala partying with my friends. They will ring in my birthday (January 1) in just a bit. So, you old people listen to bhajans, I will party on your behalf.”

She shares a laugh with grandson Ranbir Kapoor

Ranbir Kapoor had grown particularly fond of his grandma when he stayed with her a couple of years ago. The duo spent hours bonding, watching television and generally chatting about cinema. And though Mrs Kapoor was slightly uncomfortable around his two Mastiffs, Leo and Guido, she was happy to have them around because it also meant keeping her grandson close. She tiptoed around them, but was happy to watch her favourite pota play in the garden with his pets.

Besides her family, Krishnaji’s favourite people were journalist Nishi Prem (who was virtually a neighbour in Chembur) and Dimple Kapadia. Until a few years ago, Salman Khan’s mother Salma was also extremely close to Krishna. However, of late, Salma hadn’t been such a regular with this gang. They were part of her kitty group and the girls met up regularly for some food and fun. Neetu recently hosted them at her Bandra residence and their joie de vivre reverberated around her Bandra residence, long after Krishnaji and Nishi had driven off to Chembur.

Actually, some people never really go away. They continue to live in your memory forever.

Krishna Raj Kapoor with Saira Banu and Dilip Kumar

Meena Iyer (DNA; December 6, 2017)

Shashi Kapoor was a true blue Piscean.  He was charm personified one minute, tongue-in-cheek the next. But in the end, you usually warmed up to him because his charm outweighed his sarcasm.

I met him for the first time in the early ’80s at his office at Janki Kutir, near Prithvi Theatre. Seeing me dressed in a sari and a big bindi, he jested, “Are you sure you want a career in journalism? Or are you hoping to get noticed by Shyam (Benegal) and looking for a break in one of his movies? You are dressed for it.”

When I assured him I had no plans of facing the camera, he laughed and said, “I was just kidding.”

On another occasion, when I told him how flirtatious he was, he confessed that he could even romance a pole in a film. “Paint a pair of eyelashes and draw a mouth on a pole and I can even romance it,” he said. “But I’m not looking to do that with you because you are closer to Kunal’s (his elder son) age, than mine.” With Shashi, you could never have the last word. However, many of us from the media couldn’t get enough of him and were always looking for excuses to meet him.

Though he had a quirky sense of humour, he was an extremely professional actor. There were times when he was doing multiple shifts for different films on the same day. But he was very much like the English (his in-laws were British) when it came to punctuality and professionalism because he managed to pack in so much into his day. He preferred to meet journalists only during the lunch break.

The one thing that I often noticed was how frugal his food habits were. The meals that came from his home were supervised by his wife, Jennifer, who monitored his diet. Back in the day, Rishi Kapoor had once said, “Jennifer aunty had kept Shashi uncle on such a strict diet. Once she went away, he let himself go.’’

When we visited him at his home in Atlas Apartments in Mumbai, Shashi gave us a taste of the Kapoor hospitality.  Like the rest of his family, he pulled a face when I told him that I was vegetarian. “Is that any way to live?’’ he joked. Of course, his man Friday would ensure even the vegetarians were fed well.

The sight of Shashi settled in a chair in his drawing room dressed in a white kurta and a lungi still haunts me. He had put on loads of weight by the early ’90s and could not even bend to cut his toe nails. So, he had a man seated at his feet doing just that. Not that he enjoyed being ungainly, but he refused to apologise for his size!

When he teased a couple of journos and me by saying, “Oh, look, the baddies are here,’’ we would quip with “Look, fatty is here too.’’ And he always took it sportingly. How often do you see an actor allowing someone to take a jibe at him? But Shashi was different. He was real, he was fun.

And then one day everything changed. Shashi’s health started to fail. He suffered a slight memory loss. When we met him at Neetu Kapoor’s mother, Rajee Singh’s funeral, he smiled at us but there wasn’t any flicker of recognition in his eyes. Instead, there was a certain sadness in them.

In March this year, he attended the launch of his nephew Rishi Kapoor’s book Khullam Khulla at a five-star hotel in Bandra. The entire Kapoor clan was there. Though Shashi didn’t recognise most people barring his family, all of us walked up to greet him. And then something terrible happened. One of the organisers stamped on Shashi’s foot by mistake. He winced in pain and his eyes clouded with tears. Though he didn’t know who caused the pain, he looked around helplessly. In that moment, I realised that Shashi may not be able to recognise people but he was alert enough to recognise and feel the pain caused by some clumsy oaf.

That thought broke my heart...just like his demise has.


... with wife Jennifer Kendal

...In a still from Deewar (1975)

...In a still from Junoon (1978)

In a still from Sammy and Rosie Get Laid (1987)


Shashi Kapoor with daughter Sanjna and son Kunal

A veteran journalist on writing the autobiography of one of Bollywood’s most mercurial heroes
Meena Iyer (MUMBAI MIRROR; January 8, 2017)

In my 37-year-old association with the temperamental star, an ammusing moment while working on this autobiography stands out. Rishi Kapoor and I were taking our Q&A sessions at a coffee shop outside his Bandra home and as he ordered stir-fried veggies for me, he asked, utterly baffled, “How can anyone be vegetarian?” I laughed heartily, because this was quintessential Rishi Kapoor for you. Honest, brazen, unapologetic. “Honestly what do vegetarians eat? Ghaaspoos?”. He then joked that once a year, during Navarati, he did succumb to his herbivorous instincts and even that was a “hard and boring period for him”.

Many of my colleagues wondered if I had, out of some subconscious masochism, willingly walked into the lion’s den by choosing to work with one of Bollywood’s most eccentric stars. To be honest, I had done exactly that in the mid-80s, so his fits and rages were like old hat to me. I was then working with Star & Style and our columnist, the feisty Devyani Chaubal, had written a singularly nasty piece about him. He was livid. Since I was the greenhorn and the only unsuspecting one, my colleagues sent me to “break the ice” with Rishi Kapoor. And boy, oh boy, did I get a dressing down. I was quaking like a leaf when I returned to office; I was, suffice to say, altered. However, a week later, I was pleasantly surprised when he called me and gave me a no holds-barrred interview. Now, three decades later, here I was writing his life story.

Whether jovial or cranky, Rishi Kapoor’s hospitality never fails you. Food and beverages are served based on the hour of the day (or night). So if you’re there at 11 am, you are offered chaas, but if you’ve overstayed your welcome until 7.30pm, then it has to be Black Label. Some things never change in Bollywood, one might add. It also helps that Rishi Kapoor suffers from OCD and is meticulous about everything, down to his puja ritual, during which he will always light only naag champa agarbatis in front of the deity and listen to bhajans for the better part of the morning. On the other hand, a radio has to play continuously in his bathroom or bedroom, and his own repertoire of 350 odd songs, which dominate playlists even today, continue to exhilarate him. So it had become perfectly routine for me to be deep in conversation with the actor when he would suddenly jump up and go, “That’s my song!’’

Did I extract enough juice from a rather controversial innings in B-town? He was clear from the start that he didn’t want any ‘muck’. “If someone is looking for salacious details of my life, they will be disappointed,” he maintained all through. “I’m not about to give anyone vicarious pleasure by writing rubbish. But I will be as upfront as I can,” he said.

His 37-year-old marriage to Neetu Singh, for one, did have its share of fights, but about that he was not willing to get into. “When we got married, Neetu, who was at the peak of her career, quit to stay home. Before we tied the knot, we had decided that one of us would be the homemaker and the other would be the bread-winner. I was bowled over and I am totally indebted to Neetu for choosing to stay home, raise kids and hold the fort. And I was very sure, I would not give her any reason to complain.”

But then, just as I was about to give up, just when I thought that his very own claim that “this book is not to be a hagiography” was merely lip service, I was taken aback with his candour. Because when Rishi talks, he talks: he opened up about his father Raj Kapoor’s tempestuous life, his long silences with Neetu, his formal relationship with his superstar-son Ranbir, his tryst with Dawood Ibrahim, fisticuffs and fiery outbursts with colleagues back in the day. Over many cups of coffee and servings of stir-fried veggies, emerged a man who was funny, sad and honest — all at the same time. Contrary to his recently acquired brash and boisterous Twitter personality, Rishi Kapoor is as vulnerable and fragile as his porcelain-like visage from Bobby.

Speaking of Bobby, he spoke utterly honestly about being possessive about his first co-star, Dimple Kapadia, and how, despite that, they both overcame this to remain friends. He spoke of his shaky but steady relationship with Amitabh Bachchan. And most importantly, he also spoke about fighting clinical depression soon after his marriage. In a milieu where so much of our preoccupation with celebrity culture is about what goes on between a celebrity’s legs, working on this book taught me that it can indeed be refreshing to figure out what goes on between a celebrity’s ears for a change.

That dressing down from my Star & Style days finally seemed worth it, after all.

Khullam Khulla: Rishi Kapoor Uncensored
by Rishi Kapoor and Meena Iyer, published by Harper Collins, releases next week

Avinash Lohana (MUMBAI MIRROR; December 13, 2016)