Pandari Bai
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Pandari Bai (1930 - 2003) was a prominent heroine of South Indian languages films during the 1950s and 60s. She has the distinction of having acted as both heroine and mother to stalwarts such as Sivaji Ganesan and Dr. Rajkumar. She was the heroine in Sivaji's debut movie Parasakthi and also the heroine of Rajkumar's debut movie Bedara Kannappa.
She had acted in a thousand five hundred films in several languages like Tamil, Telugu, Kannada and Hindi and enjoyed a long career span of nearly half a century. She had played lead roles in many movies with success and then switched over to character roles. Besides being attractive, she had a glowing inner beauty and a distinctive affectionate air about her which made her an ideal screen mother. Her soft looks and dialogue delivery also added lustre and depth to such roles.
Interestingly, and perhaps ironically, in her later career she played the mother of stars older than she and with most of whom she had played the lead in her earlier years!
"Parasakthi" (1952, Tamil, a watershed in the history of Tamil cinema), "Thirumbi Paar" (1953, Tamil, a sadly under-rated film), "Andha Naal" (1954, a national award winner, in which her performance, according to many critics, overshadowed the brilliant acting of the legendary Sivaji Ganesan ), "Abba... aaa . Hudugi" (1959, Kannada), "Kula Deivam" (1956, Tamil), "Bhabhi" (Hindi, 1957), "Belli Moda" (1967, Kannada, the film which set Puttanna Kanagal on the ladder of success) and "Avalum Penn Dhaney" (1974, her own production, an off-beat hit film) and so many others. She did not take her bow (as has been widely reported) in the AVM box-office hit "Vazhkai" (1949). Indeed she appeared only in the Hindi version of the film, "Bahar" (surprisingly her name appeared in Hindi Cinema as `Padmini'!).
Pandari Bai also acted in a couple of Kannada serials Amma and Manethana (1998-2000). Both of them were produced by her sister Mynavathy's company Yantra Media.
A tribute to Pandari Bai in the Indian newspaper The Hindu http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/fr/2003/02/14/stories/2003021401030300.htm
