Born on April 4, 1949 in Junagadh, Gujarat, Parveen Babi attended Mount Carmel High School in Ahmedabad and graduated from St. Xavier's College, Ahmedabad in a Bachelor of Arts degree in English literature. She began her modelling career in 1972 and within a year, she bagged her Bollywood debut Charitra a year later opposite cricketer Salim Durrani. Her breakthrough role came in Yash Chopra's Deewaar opposite Amitabh Bachchan.
Soon, she became one of the highest-paid actresses in the 1970s and early 1980s as she starred in multiple blockbusters oppsoite superstars Amitabh, Shashi Kapoor, Vinod Khanna, Feroz Khan, and Dharmendra. These included Amar Akbar Anthony, Suhaag, Do Aur Do Paanch, The Burning Train, Kranti, Namak Halaal, and others. Known for her sex appeal, powerful performances, glamorous roles, and impeccable fashion sense, Parveen Babi established herself as a Bollywood icon.
However, Parveen Babi's personal life was quite a tragic one. She remained unmarried even after a string of failed relationships with Kabir Bedi, Danny Denzongpa, and Mahesh Bhatt. In the late 1980s, she was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, which grabbed headlines as the actress made shocking allegations against foreign dignitaries as well as Indian film personalities, including Amitabh Bachchan, Bill Clinton, Robert Redford, Prince Charles, Al Gore, US government, British government, French government, BJP government, Roman Catholic Church, the CIA, CBI, KGB and Mossad, of conspiring to kill her.
In fact, Parveen even made a shocking statement against Amitabh Bachchan, with whom she had given several hits, in an interview to film magazine in 1989. She was quoted as saying, "Amitabh Bachchan is a super international gangster. He is after my life. His goons kidnapped me and I was kept on an island where they performed surgery on me and planted one transmitter/chip/electronic bug right under my ear."
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In the last few years of her life, Parveen lived alone. On January 20, 2005, she was found dead in her Mumbai apartment. The post-mortem revealed that she had not consumed anything for three days, and as a consequence, starved to her death and succumbed to total organ failure and diabetes. She was just 50. Her death shocked the entire Hindi film industry and led to discussions about mental health and the pressures faced by celebrities.
READ | India's richest actress received Rs 25 as her first salary, became biggest female star, died young and penniless at...
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