Bobby arrived in the same era as Sholay — two films that could not have been more different: one a teenage rebellion wrapped in love, the other a mythic, dialogue-drenched masala epic. Both defined a generation.
Remembering Rishi Kapoor: Bobby, Karz, and a Career Reborn
Nirendra Dev
On April 30, 2020, as India sat locked down and the world grappled with a pandemic, Rishi Kapoor slipped away quietly — aged 67.
Six years on, the anniversary is a good moment to sit with a career that was richer, stranger, and more layered than the romantic hero image ever quite captured.
Born into legacy, not comfort
Born on September 4, 1952, Rishi Kapoor was the son of Raj Kapoor — one of Hindi cinema’s most towering figures. It would have been easy to assume the path was paved. It was not, quite.
His first major screen appearance came in 1970’s Mera Naam Joker, Raj Kapoor’s most ambitious and personally consuming project, where a young Rishi played an adolescent version of his father.
The film was a commercial disaster — one of the biggest of its era. But Rishi walked away from the wreckage with the 1971 National Film Award for Best Child Artist. The son had outshone the project.
Bobby was not a launch — it was a rescue
The film that made Rishi Kapoor a phenomenon —Bobby (1973) — is commonly remembered as his grand Bollywood debut. He corrected that myth himself, in a 2012 interview: “There was a misconception that the film Bobby was made to launch me as an actor. The film was actually made to pay the debts of Mera Naam Joker. Dad wanted to make a teenage love story and he did not have money to cast Rajesh Khanna.”
The film became one of the decade’s biggest hits. Dimple Kapadia, making her debut alongside him, became an icon overnight.
And Bobby arrived in the same era as Sholay — two films that could not have been more different: one a teenage rebellion wrapped in love, the other a mythic, dialogue-drenched masala epic. Both defined a generation.
Dimple Kapadia offered perhaps the most enduring tribute years later: “I lost my heart some years back — during filming Bobby — and I’m yet to get it back.”
Karz, Saagar, and the music that outlived the era
Karz (1980), directed by Subhash Ghai, gave Rishi one of his most memorable outings — and one of Hindi cinema’s most durable songs.
Kishore Kumar’s Ek Haseena Thi, Ek Diwana Tha has refused to age.
It surfaced again in Haseen Dillruba (2021) and its sequel Phir Aayi Haseen Dillruba (2024) — both available on Netflix — used to brilliant effect across a new generation of romantic thrillers starring Taapsee Pannu, Vikrant Massey, and Sunny Kaushal.
Saagar (1985) brought Dimple back to screens after years away, and became India’s official entry for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film that year. Kamal Haasan won the Filmfare Best Actor award for his performance — his only win in that category for a Hindi film — but the film’s emotional texture was a three-way creation.
Later work revealed the range. In Namaste London, a grieving NRI father watching his daughter dismiss her roots. In Damini, a husband screaming into the void: “Aadmi jhoot kyon bolta hae” — why must a man depend on falsehood — while his wife fights for justice and his family looks away.
In Mulk,
....he delivered one of the most politically charged lines of his career, playing a Muslim man defending his right to faith: “Agar aap meri daadhi aur Osama bin Laden ki daadhi mein fark nahin kar paate, to bhi mujhe haq hai apni sunnat nibhane ka.”
If you cannot tell my beard from a terrorist’s, I still have the right to practice my faith.
And in Jab Tak Hai Jaan, a single dialogue carried the weight of a whole life:
“Har ishq ka ek waqt hota hai…
woh hamara waqt nahi tha… par iska yeh matlab nahi ki woh ishq nahi tha.”
Every love has its time. That time was not ours. But that does not mean the love was not real.
It was, perhaps, the most Rishi Kapoor line ever written — and the truest epitaph for a career that asked to be felt, not just remembered.
courtesy - The Raisina Hills
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