Zee News

New Delhi, Sep 26: The "Evergreen Hero" of Hindi cinema is celebrating his 85th birthday on Wednesday. The occasion is even more special because Anand`s Biography `Romancing with life`is to be released by the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today.

Although an octogenerian, the actor, still in the pink of health and still very much popular, has given some of the choicest treasures to the Indian cinema.

Born on September 26, 1923 in Punjab`s Gurdaspur as Devdutt Pishorimal Anand, Dev Anand graduated in arts from Punjab University and came to Mumbai (then Bombay) to join elder brother Chetan Anand who was already into films.

The initial years were full of struggle as among other things he even had to sell some of his possessions and work in the Military Censor`s office reading soldiers` letters to their families.

Dev Anand`s maiden film "Ziddi" in 1948 at the Bombay Talkies brought him great success, and the following year he turned producer and launched his own banner, Navketan.

Navketan`s first offering was "Afsar" in 1950, which was followed with "Taxi Driver", "CID", "Kala Pani", "Guide" and "Jewel Thief" among others.

Dev Anand`s forte was the boy next door, part-lover, part-clown and part do-gooder.

Though he continues to make films today and his last few films haven`t been successful, he keeps going on with amazing energy.

Dev Anand has received several awards in his career including the prestigious Dada Saheb Phalke award, the highest film award. In 2001, he was awarded the Padma Bhushan for his contribution to Indian cinema.

He has acted in over 110 films, and has directed several of them.

When Dev Anand was desperately in love with Zeenat....

Evergreen hero Dev Anand was desperately in love with Zeenat Aman but was heart broken before a `date` with her found Raj Kapoor throwing his arms around her at a party.

"My heart broken to pieces....I wanted to leave the party at once and go off somewhere alone, to be just be myself, so that I could swallow the humiliation thrust on my ego," Dev Anand says in his autobiography "Romancing with life".

The octogenarian Bollywood hero`s autobiography is scheduled to be released by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in the capital on Wednesday.

"Zeenat and I started being linked to each other in the magazines and newspapers that people hungry for gossip love to read. In the subconscious, we had become emotionally attached to each other," Anand says.

Time moved on and one day he felt that he was desperately in love with Zeenat and wanted to say so to her at a very special, exclusive place meant for romance. "I pick her up and together we went to a party. The first person who greeted Zeenat was drunken Raj Kapoor with a gallant drawl who threw his arms around her," Dev says.

"A struggle within me transformed itself into a to-hell-with-it-all attitude and prompted me to say goodbye to a relationship which, though it had been non-committal emotionally on both sides, had been honest all the same," he says.

The evening had delivered a blow to Dev`s personality, and his dominating spirit. "I had decided on the spur of the movement to tell Zeenat for the first time how much I loved her. And that there was an idea in my mind of another story that would put her on a pedestal as never before, the highest so far. But that was never to be," the evergreen hero says.

In his autobiography, said to be the first ever full-fledged memoir by a leading Bollywood star, Dev Anand tells his remarkable life story, no less dramatic and gripping than any of his films. It carries recollections from Dev`s youth in 1930 in Gurdaspur and Lahore, his years of struggle in 1940s in Bombay, his friendship with Gurudutt and his doomed romance with Surayya.

The star also writes about his marriage to Kalpana Kartik, his relationship with his brothers Chetan and Vijay Anand as also his compatriots Dilip Kumar and Raj Kapoor. Dev Anand however quickly detached himself from Zeenat. "And so be it! I quickly detached myself. I had blundered, taking too many things for granted. There was no need for me to let any rancour remain in my mind against Zeenat. I had prepared her for the world and she was free to go into the arms of anyone who would help her further her ambitious dreams," he writes.

"A group of chanting devotees was passing by my car- hare Krishna Hare Krishna..I closed my eyes. Zeenat still remained beautiful in my eyes, with an honest soul. And Raj a passionate filmmaker...An idea of a new film was slowly coming into focus," he writes.

"Writing an autobiography is tougher when you are a public figure that the world has known and admired for over six decades and has looked up as a larger-than-life hero.

Unless I take my readers to a plane of absolute adoration for me as they read my book, the attempt will not have been worth it. And yet, my life has been an open book to my fans, and they must not feel that I am hiding something or glossing over some unsavoury bumps now that I have set out to write my autobiography," Dev writes.

"This is why untarnished truth and complete honesty are the first prerequisite to my writing about myself, rife as they are with the dangers of annoying or angering a few people who have rubbed shoulders with me on my journey along the path of life," Dev Anand says in the preface to the biography.

"On some occasions, I have been accused of being narcissistic, and since this book is about me, this is perhaps a charge I should answer to before I proceed," the star writes. When he was born, `Dharam` was prefixed to his `Dev` as ordained by the family Pandit. "I hung on to the `Dharam` part of my name all through my academic career. But as I stepped out into the world on my own to seek a foothold and recognition for myself, I dispensed with the `Dharam` part of my name and added Anand, my family surname to my identity," the star says.