Veteran actor, choreographer and theatre artist Zohra Sehgal, who essayed character roles with aplomb, died in New Delhi on Thursday at the age of 102
Veteran actor, choreographer and theatre artist Zohra Sehgal died at a hospital in New Delhi on Thursday.
A heart patient, Sehgal, who had turned 102 on April 27, 2014, was admitted to the Max Hospital in south Delhi’s Saket area after being diagnosed with pneumonia on Wednesday. She died of a heart attack at 4.30 p.m. Thursday.
“She died of a cardiac arrest this afternoon. She was unwell for last three-four days,” daughter Kiran Sehgal said.
Sehgal would be cremated tomorrow at 11 AM at the Lodhi Road crematorium.
The news was broken in the night by historian Irfan Habib who tweeted, “Just confirmed that Zohra Aapa is no more…” In another tweet, he said, “Extremely sad to know about d passing away of Zohra Sehgal, a woman who lived a full life on her own terms. Great loss to art and culture. RIP.”
Known as ‘the grand old lady of Bollywood’, she started her career as dancer with Uday Shankar in 1935.
In 1945, she joined Prithviraj Kapoor’s Prithvi Theatre group as an actor.
The actress, who was named the ‘Laadli of the Century’ in 2008, has appeared in many Bollywood films as a character actor as well as in English language films and television series.
She made her film debut in Indian People’s Theatre Association’s (IPTA) first film, Dharti Ke Lal (1946), which was directed by Khwaja Ahmad Abbas.
Sehgal, who last appeared in Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s ‘Saawariya’ and as Amitabh Bachchan’s mother in ‘Cheeni Kum’ in 2007, was awarded the Padma Vibhshan in 2010 and also was a Padma Shri and Padma Bhushan awardee.
She had acted in many films including ‘Veer-Zara’, ‘Saaya’, ‘Cheeni Kum’, ‘Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam’.
She also has many Hollywood movies to her credit which includes ‘Bhaji on the Beach’, ‘The Mystic Masseur’, ‘Never Say Die’, ‘Little Napoleons’ and ‘Bend It Like Beckham’.
