Down the memory lane with Tabassum

The First Lady of Television, Tabassum, is one of the very few living legends in our film industry and has been around for more than 60 years. Starting out when she was a kid. Born on July 9, 1944, she started her stint in Bollywood with film Nargis as child artiste. Since then, Read More">there hasRead More

The First Lady of Television, Tabassum, is one of the very few living legends in our film industry and has been around for more than 60 years. Starting out when she was a kid. Born on July 9, 1944, she started her stint in Bollywood with film Nargis as child artiste. Since then, there has been no looking back.

Childhood memories…
My parents had an inter-caste marriage, so since birth I was taught to respect all religions. My father was a Hindu- Punjabi while my mom was a Muslim-Pathan. My father named me Tabassum, a Muslim name because my mother was a Muslim. The meaning of my name is "smile" and I have always been smiling ever since. My mother named me Kiran Bala, so my name was a mix of two religions. I got my first movie offer from D.D. Kashyap for the film Nargis wherein I was the child artiste. I was just two years old then. My parents were both journalists and besides that my mother also used to be a dialogue writer so that is how my "filmi" connections actually happened. In all the films that I did as a child artiste I would always see my name in the end and it would go like, Nargis, Dilip Kumar and Baby Tabassum. Eventually I started thinking that my name was "And Baby Tabassum" and when anybody would ask my name I would proudly say that my name is And Baby Tabassum!

Looking back…
For my first film I was paid of Rs 5000, which was pretty high considering it was almost 60 years ago. After my film Nargis, my parents weren't too keen to allow me to continue acting and because of this reason my parents decided to hike the fee that I demanded, thinking that the producers would not be able to afford such a high amount. But then, all the producers who approached me were rich and were ready to give more money than what my parents had quoted! This way I started my journey as a child artiste and acted in several movies like Deedar, Jogan, Baiju Bawara and Bahar. I have acted as a child with stars like Dilip Kumar and Ashok Kumar. I have done movies with Vyjayantimala, Suraiya and Meena Kumari. Overall I have done about 70 to 75 films as a child artiste. It was then that I got tagged as Indian Shirley Temple. Shirley Temple was a name of a famous child artiste in Hollywood and it was a privilege to be addressed by that name.

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Then and now… Right now, I am into Spiritual Entertainment. In this form of entertainment I enlighten my viewers and talk to them about spirituality along with entertainment. I had also produced two films, Tum Par Hum Qurbaan and Kartoot and both went unnoticed. I am also the editor of the famous Hindi magazine, Read More">GrihalakshmiRead More

Then and now…
Right now, I am into Spiritual Entertainment. In this form of entertainment I enlighten my viewers and talk to them about spirituality along with entertainment. I had also produced two films, Tum Par Hum Qurbaan and Kartoot and both went unnoticed. I am also the editor of the famous Hindi magazine, Grihalakshmi from the past 15 years. Out of the whole film industry, half of them are elder to me and half of them are younger. No one is a stranger and that is one of the prime reasons why Phool Khile Hai Gulshan Gulshan went on for such a long time. I recently received the Dadasaheb Phalke Academy Award in the Legend In TV sector.

Parting shot…
I never desired awards and trophies and I am so happy that my showcase today is full of trophies and mementos that I have received for charity and social causes and not for winning any awards for my movies. I feel far more fortunate than anyone else of my age and stature. I am what I am today because of my husband and my daughter-in-law, Hemali. She is the one who inspired me to work and achieve what I wanted. My son, Hoshang was another inspiration for me. I thank God every day for the person I am today. It feels great because now it's my grand- daughter, the third generation in my family, who is getting into films. My grand-daughter, Khushi will be seen in her debut movie next month. I am very excited about it and wish her all the best. If success doesn't come your way, don't be disappointed. There are innumerable options and if one door closes then another one will surely open, so never lose heart. At the same time don't let success get to your head. Be level-headed and the person you actually are always.

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Life goes on…. By this time I had got married to Vijay Govil. At the age of 20 I was a mother and I decided that now I would devote myself to motherhood completely, Read More">but destiny had different plans in store for me. As a child I had done a little bit of radio andRead More

Life goes on….
By this time I had got married to Vijay Govil. At the age of 20 I was a mother and I decided that now I would devote myself to motherhood completely, but destiny had different plans in store for me. As a child I had done a little bit of radio and it helped me make a career. Back then in 1970, before Doordarshan came to India, Saridon Ke Saathi which was hosted by Ameen Sayani offered me a ten-minute slot in their programme. The show Jokes Of Tabassum went on for 18 years where I used to narrate small anecdotes and jokes. My listeners from Pakistan and Middle East used to send me mails praising my narrative style. At that time things seemed to be going great on the professional front. As of today about 10 joke-books have been published in India. I have written them in English, Hindi and Urdu. I have a collection of more than 1 lakh jokes with me and today these shows like Laughter Challenge and Comedy Circus use my jokes. Not once have they acknowledged me or given credit to my work, but I hold no grudges against them.

Television calling…
It was quite late in life that I got the opportunity to work with television. In 1972, when Doordarshan came to India, Krishnamoorthy, the director of Phool Khile Hai Gulshan Gulshan expressed his desire to work with me. Out of the four-hour transmission that Doordarshan had, I was offered 30 minutes. In such a short time I was required to interview a celebrity, telecast film songs and one dance performance. It became almost impossible to interview a star in ten minutes and the time was increased to half an hour just for celebrity interview. The show went on for 21 years from 1972 to 1993. In this tenure I interviewed every star from Bollywood. The only two people I couldn't interview were Raj Kapoor and Deven Verma. The stars on my show used to talk intermittently so to fill in the gaps I used to talk and eventually everyone started labelling me talkative. The talent shows that we see today were actually started by me 35 years back. It was at that time that I started Tabassum Hit Parade for promoting new talent. In fact Sunidhi Chauhan and Johny Lever were my discoveries.

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Growing-up years… One thing that I want to really thank my parents is for urging me to finish school and higher studies. Both of them being journalists laid a lot of importance on education. I finished my schooling and my higher studies with a B.A from Aligarh University. During my growing-up years, Read More">I learnt UrduRead More

Growing-up years...
One thing that I want to really thank my parents is for urging me to finish school and higher studies. Both of them being journalists laid a lot of importance on education. I finished my schooling and my higher studies with a B.A from Aligarh University. During my growing-up years, I learnt Urdu from my parents and got into the habit of writing books. Besides that I always used to participate in stage and musical shows right from school. In college and even after college I did a lot of charity shows for social causes.

Journey of films…
When I was out of college, I got a lot of film offers but none lived up to my expectations. I was offered roles that had very little potential to show my acting prowess. The films that I accepted bombed at the box-office. When I was a child everybody wanted to rope me in for their films but once I finished with my schooling everything had changed. I did a few stunt films like Tarzan Ki Mehbooba and Zimbo Ka Beta, which fared very badly. After that I got offered only side roles and I accepted some of them but even that didn't work out. People did films either for money of fame but I got none. At this stage I was heartbroken because I had so many dreams that I wanted to fulfill.

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