Malini Sharma

QAMYAB – THE FORGOTTEN GEMS OF BOLLYWOOD

Qamyab is our humble tribute to all those lesser-known actors, one hit wonders and junior artists who we see umpteen times but don’t know about; beyond their faces. These actors have been an integral part of Bollywood but didn’t get their due. This series is our sincere attempt to put a name to these faces, familiarize them to our readers and celebrate their achievements in life – however big or small. We believe that every artist contributes in his/her own way to the cinema’s success. Qamyab will explore the unknown lives of such actors and artists as we believe even these forgotten gems of Bollywood deserve their due recognition today.

We have covered many one film wonders in our forgotten gems’ series so far. These are actors, who disappeared after doing one movie. Most of them opted for an alternate career or settled down in marital bliss.

Our today’s article is also on one such actress, who was once a big name in the modelling world. She appeared in one major hit in 2002 and then, suddenly disappeared from the film industry. She is Malini Sharma. The name may not resonate quickly with some readers as it has been more than two decades since we saw her on celluloid.

Before entering Bollywood, Malini was a top model and did ramp walks as well as anchored several events. This was the time when Bollywood had opened its doors to models, who turned actors. Big names like Milind Soman, Malaika Arora, Dino Morea, John Abraham, Bipasha Basu, etc transitioned from the ramp to big screen. Malini Sharma belonged to the same league of models.

Born in Delhi on 5th January, 1974, she always kept a low profile and hence, not much is known about her personal life. What is known that Malini started modelling at a tender age and extensively travelled across the world for fashion shows.

After a successful stint as a Delhi based model, Malini shifted to city of dreams Mumbai. Like it does to every citizen, the cosmopolitan Mumbai welcomed Malini with open arms and she achieved even bigger success here.

At the peak of her career, Malini Sharma met an upcoming model turned actor Priyanshu Chatterjee of Tum Bin (2001) fame. Both fell in love and got married in 1997. At the time of wedding, Priyanshu was only twenty-four years old while Malini was just twenty-three.

The couple kept themselves busy on the professional front and worked on several plum modelling assignments. Soon enough, Malini started receiving offers for music videos and TV serials.

During the late ’90s, the Indie pop wave was at its peak and Malini got a chance to be a part of it when she appeared in Mika’s debut song ‘Saawan mein lag gayi aag’. The song featured Malini opposite the Badman of Bollywood Gulshan Grover, who is trying to forcefully marry her but she elopes with her lover Mika. This song became an instant success and made Malini Sharma a household name.

Next, Malini became part of one more popular Indie pop number ‘Kya soorat hai’ sung by Bombay Vikings, who later became popular as Neeraj Shridhar. This song was a remake version of Kishore Kumar’s old classic ‘Zaroorat hai zaroorat hai’. In the song, Malini is shown pursued by Raju Sundaram (Prabhu Deva’s brother) on the streets of Bangalore. This number was again a big hit and gave more recognition to Malini.

With a successful modelling career and a noteworthy presence on Indie pop front, an acting career was not too far away for Malini Sharma. In 2000, she started doing television and her debut serial was Hum Dono, which had known names like R. Madhavan, Trupti Toradmal and Vishal Singh. The same year, Malini went on to do C.A.T.S, which was aired on Sony TV. This was basically a desi version of the Hollywood hit Charlie’s Angels. The series had four girls Nafisa Joseph (Careena), Karminder Kaur (Amrita), Malini Sharma (Tanya) and Kuljeet Randhawa (Ash) working as detectives for a mysterious figure Charlie (Ninad Kamat). The show ran for more than thirty episodes and was a decent success.

After getting noticed on television, Bollywood was the natural progression for Malini Sharma. That happened to her in form of Vishesh Films’ Raaz (2002), written by the legendary Mahesh Bhatt and directed by Vikram Bhatt. It is interesting to know the background behind this movie…

The horror specialists Ramsay Brothers had lost their touch in the ’90s and Hindi horror films got relegated to small time makers, who made low grade content mixed with cheap thrills and sex. Steadily, horror movies were becoming a rarity in Bollywood.

In early ‘2000s, the Mahesh Bhatt camp decided to venture in to this neglected space and launched a horror film titled Raaz (2002). Initially, Anil Kapoor was offered the lead role but he declined it as horror films were considered B grade in those days. Lisa Ray was approached to play the female lead in Raaz but she too left the film for unknown reasons.

Finally, Vikram Bhatt cast rank newcomers Bipasha Basu and Dino Morea, who were then just one film old. Raaz had another important character, which was offered to Malini Sharma. Malini instantly accepted this small but pivotal role.

Raaz revolved around a young couple Dino and Bipasha, whose marriage is on the rocks. Dino tries to give their marriage a last chance and travels with Bipasha to Ooty, the place where they fell in love. But unknown to them, a ghastly past is awaiting them there…

Malini Sharma played Dino’s girlfriend turned ghost, who wreaks havoc on everyone. She appears in the film’s second half and the audience were pleasantly surprised to see the ‘Kya soorat hai’ girl in this role. Malini played a schizophrenic lady, who seduces Dino Morea with her husky voice. Her character was also named Malini and she even had a song of her own- ‘Aap ke pyar mein hum savarne lage’.

Raaz became a super hit at the box office and the audience loved Malini Sharma. In fact, many found her sexier and more seductive than the heroine Bipasha Basu. Malini’s outstanding performance fetched her the best debutant actress award at Zee Cine Awards in 2003, where she was honoured by Akshay Kumar and Sonali Bendre.