Dimple Kapadia in Bobby (1973)

Although Raj Kapoor is now best remembered for the films he made with Nargis in the 1940s and 50s, such as Awaara and Shree 420, this late film is justifiably regarded as key to his oeuvre. After the box-office failure of Mera naam joker (MNJ) (1969), it seemed that Raj Kapoor’s long career as star, producer and director was over. Having decided that he no longer wanted to act, he came up with the idea of making a teenage love story with his middle son, Rishi, who had already appeared in MNJ. Rishi was still a teenager, and Raj Kapoor presented a new heroine, Dimple Kapadia, who bore more than a passing resemblance to Nargis.

Raj (Rishi Kapoor) has just finished school and returned to his rich but unloving parents. He meets Bobby (Dimple Kapadia), the granddaughter of his wet-nurse, Mrs Braganza (Durga Khote), and falls in love with her but his parents forbid the relationship …

K. A. Abbas, who had earlier worked with Raj Kapoor, wrote the Romeo and Juliet story, but with the addition of a happy ending to avoid the risk of box-office failure. Laxmikant-Pyarelal, with the lyricist Anand Bakshi, composed many hit songs, including among others an Ashkenazy wedding waltz (‘Main shair to nahin’), a qawwali (Sufi- inspired devotional song), a Goan folk song (‘Jhooth bole kauwa khaate’) and the suggestive ‘Hum tum ek kamre mein’. The young couple, in their outrageously fashionable clothes, ranging from hotpants, bikinis and miniskirts to leather suits and goggles, set a trend for all youngsters and sparked a host of teenage romances from Love Story (1981) to those of the 1990s.

Rishi Kapoor assumed the role of major romantic hero for the next twenty years, beginning his career during the reign of Amitabh Bachchan, and ending as the new generation of Khans dominated the box office in the early 1990s. Dimple, aged about sixteen when she made this film, married the reigning superstar, Rajesh Khanna, during the shooting of the film (the henna of her wedding decorations can be seen on her hand during the song ‘Mujhe kuch kehna hai’) and she was pregnant with Twinkle before the premier. Her comeback was with Rishi in 1985′s Saagar, after which she became an iconic figure in the film industry, appearing in films such as Farhan Akhtar’s Dil chahta hai.

One scene in particular stands out: when Raj visits Bobby’s house, she is making pakodas and wipes the batter into her hair, as Nargis was said to have done when Raj Kapoor visited her house. Her line, ‘Mujhse dosti karoge? Will you be my friend?’, has inspired a generation of younger film-makers to emphasise love as friendship, from Sooraj Barjatya, whose Maine pyar kiya quoted several scenes from Bobby, to Karan Johar’s Kuch kuch hota hai, where the teacher is called Miss Braganza (Bobby’s surname), to Kunal Kohli’s film Mujhse dosti karoge (2002) – Rachel Dwyer

Cast and Production Credits

Year – 1973, Genre – Drama, Country – India, Language – Hindi, Producer –Raj Kapoor, Director – Raj Kapoor, Music Director – Laxmikant-Pyarelal, Cast - Rishi Kapoor, Dimple Kapadia, Pran, Premnath, Sonia Sahni, Durga Khote, Aruna Irani, Farida Jalal, Piloo Wadia, Prem Chopra, Sashi Kiran, Jagdish Raaj, Narendra Chanchal