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Rehana Sultan was all set to be a path-breaker.
The time was right.
Hindi cinema had emerged from the 1960s musicals era.
But somehow, leading film-makers of the time did not believe Rehana had that cachet.
It was Zeenat Aman who ended up being the definitive taboo-trasher of the era.
Dinesh Raheja salutes the trendsetter of the 1970s, Rehana Sultan.
IMAGE: Rehana Sultan in Chetna.
Rehana Sultan, the trendsetter from the 1970s, has recently been in the spotlight because of her hospitalisation for a cardiac valve replacement which necessitated financial assistance from Bollywood biggies.
But Rehana deserves to be highlighted much more for being an agent of change in Hindi cinema.
At just 20 years of age, she became the second Hindi film actress to win the National Award for Best Actress (for Dastak, 1970).
In the same year, Rehana headlined the critical and commercial smash, Chetna (1970).
The gritty film presented her as a brazen, hard-boiled prostitute diametrically different from the weepy nautch girls of contemporaneous films like Pakeezah and Amar Prem.
IMAGE: Anil Dhawan and Rehana Sultan in Chetna.
Chetna and Dastak dragged Hindi cinema, kicking and screaming, into a bold, experimental new era. An FTII (Film and TV Institute of India) gold medalist, Rehana shot to prominence with these two films.
She was in the vanguard of the FTII invasion of the 1970s wherein trained actors (Jaya Bhaduri, Shabana Azmi, Naseeruddin Shah, Om Puri) brought new techniques and fresh realism to Hindi films.
Chetna tackled sexual content in an unembarrassed form for the first time in Hindi films.
In this sensational sheet-rumpler, Rehana is a revelation as a prostitute by choice who smokes and drinks but is presented in a nuanced manner. Director B R Ishara created a character unlike any played hitherto by a Hindi film heroine.
Despite her avowed disbelief in love, an idealistic beau (Anil Dhawan) marries the leading lady but her resurgent sense of self goes into a tailspin when she discovers she is pregnant from one of her ex-customers.
Rehana is fearless in capturing the essence of her character, even when she is given some rather frank dialogue in the scene in which she lies in the bed of her boudoir and taunts Anil. This drama takes the camera past the bedroom door.
Anil marvels even today, “Rehana gave a fantastic performance, one of the best. Her dialogue delivery was impeccable.”
And the film’s poster is marked for posterity. The much publicised image of a dazed Anil Dhawan standing in the distance between the inverted ‘V’ formed by the two bare legs of a woman standing akimbo helped propel the film and Rehana to instant fame.
IMAGE: Rehana Sultan and Sanjeev Kumar in Dastak.
Rehana quickly consolidated her position as a significant talent with Dastak. A fabulous psychodrama, Dastak is on the cusp of old and new cinema being among the last impactful black-and-white films (along with Anubhav).
It marries marvellous music sense with avant-garde sensibility.
Directed by litterateur Rajinder Singh Bedi, the film delves into the life of a couple (Sanjeev Kumar and Rehana Sultan) who move from a jhopda to a rundown flat earlier inhabited by a sex worker.
Constant dastaks (knocks) by clients on their door leads to psychological warfare on the wife — there are bids to abduct her, seduce her and lure her into prostitution, especially because of her talent for singing. Her slow mental disintegration sees her teetering on the boundaries of the choices being pushed on her.
Rehana’s expressive kohl-lined eyes in the film’s many tight close-ups convey the spatial experience of the surroundings closing in on her character.
It’s a dark, brooding performance in an atmospheric little gem. With the help of some great Madan Mohan-Lata Mangeshkar songs (Maai Re Main Kaa Se Kahoon, Baiyaa Na Dharon), Rehana has enough emotional arsenal to make the maina in a cage feel like an unnecessary cliché in the film.
Fueled by the twin critical successes, Rehana Sultan decided that she wouldn’t play second fiddle to heroes.
She was all set to be a path-breaker.
The time was right.
Hindi cinema had emerged from the 1960s musicals era.
But somehow, leading film-makers of the time did not believe Rehana had that cachet.
It was Zeenat Aman who ended up being the definitive taboo-trasher of the era.
IMAGE: Rehana Sultan, Satish Kaul and Nana Palshikar on the Prem Parbat poster.
Though a trained, talented actress, Rehana struggled with this inability to translate her choices into big-time stardom.
She essayed a challenging role in Prem Parbat (1973) as an old man’s guilt-ridden wife who is torn by her attraction to a younger lover (Satish Kaul).
But the film flopped despite the presence of the exquisite Lata nugget Yeh Dil Aur Unki Nigahon Ke Saaye.
Another beautiful song which would find a place among Lata’s best in the early 1970s was also filmed on Rehana: Rasm-e-Ulfat Ko Nibhaye Toh Nibhaye Kaise,
IMAGE: Rehana Sultan and Alka in Khote Sikkay.
The film Dil Ki Raahein (1973) was a home production that had Rehana playing a doctor in love with a married man from a different religion (Rakesh Panday).
Rehana’s spirited performance went unnoticed because this film too failed to create any ripples.
Commercial ventures focused overtly on Rehana’s sex appeal also didn’t work — the Deven Verma produced Bada Kabutar and the Vinod Mehra starrer Ooparwala Jaane are cases in point. Rehana acted in three more films opposite Anil Dhawan but they couldn’t replicate Chetna‘s triumph.
A rare success in this period for Rehana was Khote Sikkay (1974) in which she was paired opposite an A-list star like Feroz Khan.
She played a courtesan in Khote Sikkay and in Sajjo Rani (1976) directed by Govind Saraiya (of Saraswatichandra fame) Rehana played a courtesan’s daughter. The Chetna image remained indelibly inked to her name.
IMAGE: Mahendra Sandhu, Asha Sachdev and Rehana Sultan in Agent Vinod.
A significant film starring Rehana Sultan in the latter years of the decade was the box office hit, Agent Vinod (1977).
Rehana got an ‘and above all’ credit and had an action-packed role as a feisty secret agent.
Rehana got another ‘and above all’ credit when she reteamed with Rajinder Singh Bedi to play the elder sister in the romantic triangle Nawab Sahib (1978).
The only memorable aspects of the film are Sahir’s lyrics and C Arjun’s music score.
By the turn of the decade, Rehana was playing supporting roles in inconsequential films, save for the Vijay Anand-Shabana Azmi starrer Hum Rahe Na Hum (1984).
Not surprisingly, Rehana once again played a libertine who smokes in the open, but the film did fetch her a nomination for the Best Supporting Actress award from Filmfare.
IMAGE: Anil Dhawan and Rehana Sultan in Chetna.
In the same year, Rehana married her Chetna director B R Ishara and eased out of films. Her husband passed away in 2012 leaving Rehana in dire financial straits and no children to support her.
It seems incredible that a well-known actress of 30 films and a film-maker who directed films starring Dev Anand, Sanjeev Kumar, Shashi Kapoor, Amitabh Bachchan, Jaya Bachchan, Rekha, Rajesh Khanna etc should not be materially secure.
Rehana had four cars at one time but she was never financially savvy.
Hopefully, Rehana will soon be well enough to resume work of the calibre she deserves to get.
Rehana devoted several years of her life to her art; it’s time for payback.
