Balraj Sahni

Balraj Sahni was a prominent Indian film and stage actor and writer, who is best known for his realistic and naturalistic performances in films such as Dharti Ke Lal (1946), Do Bigha Zamin (1953), Kabuliwala (1961) and Garam Hawa (1973). He was also the brother of Bhisham Sahni, a noted Hindi writer, playwright and actor. Balraj Sahni was born as Yudhishthir Sahni on 1 May 1913 in Rawalpindi, Punjab, British India. His father, Kunjlal Ganguly, was a lawyer and his mother, Gouri Devi, was a housewife. He was the eldest of four children. He studied at Government College and Gordon College in Lahore, where he completed his master's degree in English Literature. He also held a bachelor's degree in Hindi. In 1936, he married Damayanti, a fellow student and theatre enthusiast. They moved to Shantiniketan in Bengal to join Rabindranath Tagore's Visva-Bharati University as teachers of English and Hindi. Their son, Parikshit, was born there in 1940. Sahni also collaborated with Mahatma Gandhi for a year in 1938 and participated in the freedom struggle. In 1939, he went to England to join the BBC-London's Hindi service as a radio announcer. He returned to India in 1943 and joined the Indian People's Theatre Association (IPTA) as an actor and writer. ² Sahni made his film debut in 1946 with Insaaf, followed by Dharti Ke Lal, directed by KA Abbas, which was one of the first films to depict the Bengal famine of 1943. His wife, Damayanti, also acted in the film, but she died of tuberculosis in 1947 at the age of 26. Sahni remarried in 1951 to Santosh Chandhok, a writer and television personality. ² Sahni rose to fame with his role as Shambhu Mahato, a poor farmer who struggles to save his land from a greedy landlord, in Bimal Roy's classic Do Bigha Zamin in 1953. The film won the international prize at the Cannes Film Festival and established Sahni as a leading actor of Hindi cinema. He followed it up with another memorable performance as Abdul Rehman Khan, a Pathan merchant who befriends a young girl in Kabuliwala, based on a story by Tagore, in 1961. He also acted in films such as Seema (1955), Sone Ki Chidiya (1958), Bhabhi Ki Chudiyaan (1961), Kathputli (1957), Lajwanti (1958), Ghar Sansaar (1958) and Waqt (1965), playing a variety of roles, from romantic leads to villains to character parts. He was also a good singer and sang some songs in his films. ² Sahni won several awards and accolades for his acting. He won the National Film Award for Best Actor in 1981 for his performance as Salim Mirza, an elderly Muslim man who faces the trauma of partition and communal violence, in Garam Hawa, which was his last film. He also won the Kerala State Film Award for Second Best Actor twice, in 1974 for Adhiti and in 1978 for Thacholi Ambu. He was also nominated for the Filmfare Award for Best Actor in 1982 for Ahimsa. He was honoured with the Padma Shri in 1969 by the Government of India for his contributions to Indian cinema. ² Sahni died of a cardiac arrest on 13 April 1973 in Bombay, Maharashtra, India, at the age of 59. He was cremated at the Juhu Crematorium. His death was mourned by the film industry and his fans, who remembered him as one of the finest actors of Indian cinema.