Meenakshi Sheshadri is the very epitome of elegance and grace. Her unparalleled beauty and dancing skills have earned her a name in the film industry- a name that is written with indelible ink in the pages of history of Bollywood.
Life before Bollywood:
Meenakshi, a Tamilian, was born as Shashikala, on 16th November, 1958 in Jharkhand. In 1981, when she was 23, she won the coveted Miss India beauty pageant.
Bollywood:
• Her first Bollywood film was the romantic Painter Babu (1983).
• Her next film gave her a real taste of success: Hero (1983). She played Radha, a girl kidnapped by a group of men, including Jackie Shroff. Her naïve character and innocence only added charm to her fresh and youthful looks.
• Meri Jung (1985) is another Subhash Ghai film, in which she played Anil Kapoor’s love interest.
• In Ganga Jamuna Saraswathi (1988) she played Jamuna, the female lead, with Amitabh Bachchan.
• In the same year she worked with Amitabh in another film: Shahenshah (1988). The film was a huge hit.
• 1988 was a good year for Meenakshi. She played Sapna in Yash Chopra’s Vijay (1988), also starring Rajesh Khanna, Anil Kapoor, Rishi Kapoor and Hema Malini.
• She played the female lead in the love story Gharana (1989).
• She made her presence felt in the action film Joshilaay (1989).
• In Toofan (1989) she played Radha once more; the film had Amitabh in double role- 2 brothers separated at birth. Meenakshi played the lover of one of the brothers, and Amrita Singh was the other one.
• In the family drama Ghar Ho To Aisa (1990) she played the stubborn feminist Seema, opposite Anil Kapoor.
• In the critically acclaimed Ghayal (1990) she played a journalist, Varsha Bharti, in love with Sunny Deol, who is wrongly accused of his brother’s murder.
• Meenakshi then played the role of her lifetime in Rajkumar Santoshi’s Damini (1993). As Damini she essayed not just a strong character, but one of the strongest characters that Bollywood has seen.
• In 1996 she worked in another Rajkumar Santoshi film, Ghatak. This film has been touted to be her last one.
• Do Rahain (1997), as per some sources, is actually her last movie. There isn’t any information on this one.
After Bollywood:
Meenakshi married an investment banker, Harish Mysore and settled down in Texas, USA. She has 2 children: a daughter Kendra and a son Josh. Apparently she is teaching Bharatnatyam, Kathak and Odissi.
Fun fact:
Apparently Subhash Ghai believed it was lucky for him if the leading lady of his film had a name starting with the letter M. Meenakshi worked with him in Hero and it was a huge hit. What if she had not changed her name from Shashikala to Meenakshi? Would the film have flopped? Can’t say!
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