Hema Malini, a.k.a. ‘Dream Girl’, is an accomplished Indian actress and a dedicated Bharatanatyam choreographer.
Born on Oct. 16, 1948 at Ammankudi, Tamil Nadu, Hema’s father, V.S.R. Chakravarthy and mother, Jaya was a film producer.
Her first appearance in the silver screen was the role of a Bharatanatyam dancer in the Telugu movie ‘Pandava Vanavasam’.
In 1964, she was rejected for the lead role by a Tamil movie director, Sridhar on grounds that she lacked star appeal.
Hema was dejected and was later determined to make it big in Bollywood, which she eventually did. She attained her first break with ‘Sapno Ka Saudagar’, opposite Raj Kapoor. There was no looking back thereafter.
Hema went on to star in a lot of movies during the 70s and 80s and carved a niche for herself as ‘The Dream Girl of Bollywood’.
Hema was best known for her performance in ‘Sholay’, ‘Sita Aur Geeta’ and ‘The Burning Train’. She won the Filmfare Best Actress Award for ‘Seeta Aur Geeta’. After a hiatus, she returned to portraying character and cameo roles in movies like ‘Baghban’ and ‘Veer-Zaara’.
Hema received proposals from top stars like Jeetendra and Sanjeev Kumar but she married Dharmendra in 1980 after a lot of complications.
Dharmendra had to switch religions to tie the knot with Hema because his religion forbade him for a second marriage while his first wife was alive.
Both of them converted to Islamic religion and got married. They have two daughters, Esha Deol and Ahana Deol.
Esha and Ahana are trained classical dancers and together with Hema, they have performed in many charity events.
Hema was elected in the Rajya Sabha with support from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

(By: Deepika Jayasurya)