Actor Vinod Khanna loses battle with cancer
Veteran actor and Member of Parliament Vinod Khanna the Bollywood heartthrob best known for his roles in films such as “Amar Akbar Anthony,” “Qurbaani” and “Insaaf” — died of cancer at a hospital on Thursday morning. He was 70.
“He passed away at 11.20 AM. It’s a sad moment for us...
We request you all (media) for privacy,” the actor’s brother Pramod Khanna said.
Khanna was admitted to the Sir HN Reliance Foundation Hospital on March 31 with complications arising out of severe dehydration.
An official statement from the hospital said Khanna was suffering from bladder cancer.
The actor is survived by his wife, Kavita Khanna, and four children - Rahul, Akshaye, Sakshi, and Shraddha.
Rahul and Akshaye, both actors, were from his first wife, Geetanjali.
Feted as one of the most handsome actors of the Hindi film industry, Khanna made his acting debut in 1968 with “Man Ka Meet”. In many of the earlier films, Khanna played a negative or a supporting role.
His potential was first noticed in Gulzar’s “Mere Apne” in 1971.
A much sought after actor in the 1970s and 1980s, he acted in several blockbusters, including “Mera Gaon Mera Desh”, “Reshma Aur Shera”, “Elan”, “Insaaf ” and “Dayavan”.
He and Amitabh Bachchan were a popular pair, and acted in several films such as “Amar Akbar Anthony”, “Here Pheri” and “Muqaddar Ka Sikandar”.
At the height of his popularity, Khanna surprised his fans when he took a break from acting for five years to join Osho Rajneesh at his ashram in Pune in 1982.
But he returned to cinema in the late eighties, and courted success again with films such as “Insaaf” and “Satyameva Jayate”.
He was was last seen in the Shah Rukh Khan-starrer “Dilwale” in 2015.
Khanna was also an active politician, and a Member of Parliament from Gurdaspur, Punjab.
The sitting MP had won the seat four times.
Khanna’s contemporary Shatrughan Sinha described his death as a personal loss.
“Vinod Khanna was a greatly admired personality. It’s a personal and emotional loss for me as we have been very close and journeyed together in films as well as in politics,” Sinha who worked with Khanna in hits like “Mere Apne”, “Bombay 405” and “Do Yaar”, said.
Celebrities, young and old, remembered him as one of the most charismatic personalities of the Hindi film world.
Veteran singer Asha Bhosle remembered him as “a decent man and a star till the very end.”
Rishi Kapoor, who played Khanna’s younger brother in “Amar Akbar Anthony” and worked with him in another memorable hit “Chandni”, tweeted, “Will miss you Amar. RIP. Remembering the good times with you, Vinod. Thank you for being my friend.”
Superstar Rajinikanth said, “My dear friend Vinod Khanna... Will miss you, RIP. My heartfelt condolences to the family.”
Filmmaker Karan Johar said, “His screen presence is unparallelled even today... his super star swag is what we grew up on .... RIP Vinodkhanna ...thoughts and prayers.”
Actor Akshay Kumar said Khanna’s passing was the end of an era.
“Sad to learn about the passing away of Vinod Khanna Sir, one of the most charismatic actors...truly end of an era.”
Actorturned-politician Vinod Khanna, a four-time MP from Gurdaspur Lok Sabha seat in Punjab, was popularly known as "Sardar of bridges" for connecting remote villages in his constituency. 70-year-old Khanna died of bladder cancer at a hospital in Mumbai on Thursday. As the news of his death spread, his constituency went into a state of mourning.
"The news has come as a great shock to us. We cannot believe that he is no more. He was ever so helpful and did so much for his constituency," 78-year-old Jarnail Singh, a Pathankot-based resident in Gurdaspur Lok Sabha constituency, said.
Suave and easy to mingle with voters, Khanna was always a crowd puller in his constituency. He even bought a house in the region so that he could have easy access to the peo- ple of his constituency. He had demanded a special package for border districts to create employment opportunities and promote adventure and spiritual tourism in his border constituency during the 2014 Lok Sabha polls.
After joining the BJP in 1997, Khanna was fielded from Gurdaspur parliamentary seat in 1998. He met the expectations of the saffron party when he unseated veteran Con- gress leader and five-time MP Sukhbuns Kaur Bhinder with a handsome margin. He again trounced Bhinder in 1999 and 2004 Lok Sabha polls.
However, he had to taste defeat in 2009 Lok Sabha elections when he was defeated by Congress candidate Partap Singh Bajwa. Khanna took his 'sweet revenge' in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections when he thrashed Bajwa with a margin of over 1.30 lakh votes.
The veteran actor is survived by his wife, Kavita Khanna, and four children Rahul, Akshaye, Sakshi, and Shraddha. He had always said that he considered his constituency as his fifth child.
"Gurdaspur constituency is my child. In fact, it is my fifth child which needs my attention the most," he had said during poll campaigning for the 2014 Lok Sabha polls.
Khanna, who had donned the hats of Union Minister for Culture and Tourism, and Minister of State for External Affairs in 2002 and 2003 respectively, was popularly known as "Sardar of bridges" for building several bridges on Ravi and Beas rivers. "He got several bridges built on Ravi, Beas and Ujh rivers. These bridges helped in connecting several villages located at far off places with the city and as a result of which Gurdaspur got developed," said his close aide Samarinder Sharma.