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Hema Malini was enjoying the best phase of her career when she married Dharmendra in 1980. She was one of the top actors of the Hindi film industry, and in her personal life too, despite all the controversies, she was now getting married to the love of her life. Even though he was already married to Prakash Kaur, Hema and Dharmendra had decided that they had to solemnise their relationship. It was around this time, that Hema found herself in a huge financial mess. Such was the mess that it went on for ten years, and Hema went through the “worst phase” of her life.
Hema’s career, from the beginning, was managed by her parents – Jaya Chakravarthy and VS Ramanujam Chakravarthy. After making many hit films in the 1970s, and being one of the top earners in the film industry, Hema found out in the early 1980s that she owed tax of Rs 1 crore to the government, and now, she was expected to pay it all. In those days, actors weren’t making money in crores, and so, this amount of money was certainly overwhelming, even for a star of her repute.
In her biography, Hema Malini: Beyond The Dream Girl, written by Ram Kamal Mukherjee, this episode of Hema’s life is discussed in detail. The book says that “Dharmendra offered to help, but she would have none of it.” Hema also spoke about this time in her life, and said that her mother was quite laidback about paying taxes, despite her father’s constant reminders. “My father would keep reminding Amma that we need to pay the taxes, but my mother, being naive, felt it was unfair to expect us to pay so much tax since her daughter was working so hard to earn that money,” she shared and added that her parents often had arguments about this issue.
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It was after her father’s death that they found out about the taxes they owed. “Unfortunately, only after my father’s demise did we realise that we had got into a financial soup over the years. We had to clear a lot of pending taxes,” she shared. At this point, Hema needed a lot of money, and for an actor, the easiest way to do so was by making as many films as she could, and this led to a major compromise in the quality of films that she was doing until then. Mukherjee described in the book that Hema took up a lot of “B-grade” films as none of the big banners were willing to bet on her. By this time, Hema was already a mother to two girls.
“It was the worst phase of my life, and it lasted for almost ten years,” Hema shared and added, “I had to clear my debts and barring these films, I had nothing. Dance shows would keep me going, but the majority of the money came from movies.”
Dharmendra and Hema Malini first worked together in Sharafat. (Photo: Express Archives)
Esha, who was quite young at the time, shared that she got to know about this episode only when she asked her mother about her choice of films in the 1980s. “After Ahaana was born, I realised that Mom had started shooting a lot. She would barely be at home. Later on, when we watched a few films like Durga, Anjaam, Sitapur Ki Geeta and Jamai Raja, I remember asking her why she was doing these movies. That is when she told me about the debt,” she recalled. Hema turned to production and direction towards the late 1980s-early 1990s.
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Dharmendra passed away on November 24 in Mumbai.
