Veteran Bollywood actress Sadhana dies

IANSMumbai

Veteran Bollywood actress Sadhana Shivdasani, 74, died yesterday morning in Mumbai after a long battle with cancer, a family friend said.She was a widow, and is survived by her foster daughter. “Sadhana died at her home yesterday morning,” a close friend and BJP city spokesperson Shaina N C said.A top-rung Bollywood star in the 1960s and 1970s, Sadhana was born in Karachi, now in Pakistan. However, after partition, when she was barely seven, her family migrated to India and settled in Bombay.She entered films as a child artiste in 1955 with a minor role in Raj Kapoor’s film, Shree 420.Later, in 1958, she acted in India’s first Sindhi language film ‘Abaana’ in a significant role, on a token payment of Re1.When a promotional picture of the movie appeared on the cover of a film magazine, it was noticed by a prominent producer, Sashadhar Mukherjee, and she joined his acting school.Sadhana’s co-student then was her future co-star Joy Mukherjee. The duo starred in Love in Shimla, a musical superhit of 1960 produced by Sashadhar Mukherjee for Filmalaya Productions and directed by his son R K Nayyar, whom she married later.She never looked back since and followed with the highly-acclaimed film Parakh the following year and another musical superhit Hum Dono with the legendary Dev Anand.Paired with the top heroes of that era, Sadhana continued her trailblazing career with notable films like Ek Musafir, Ek Hasina, Asli Naqli, Mere Mehboob  - her first colour movie, Woh Kaun Thi, Rajkumar, Waqt, Aarzoo, Mera Saaya, Gaban, Ek Phool, Do Mali and many others till her voluntary retirement from Bollywood in 1994.