7th April marks the birthday of Jeetendra who is a well-known Indian actor. Jeetendra is popularly known for his dancing skills. Not only this but he was awarded a Filmfare Lifetime Achievement Award in 2003 and the Screen Lifetime Achievement Award in 2006. He had done more than 80 remakes of various South Indian films especially of Telugu Superstar Krishna with whom he has a close association.
On the special day of his birthday here are some interesting facts about the actor you should know.
-The actor was born on 7th April 1942 in Punjab’s Amritsar, and his birth name is Ravi Kapoor.
- Jeetendra’s beginning in movies is quite filmy. His parents were into imitation jewelry business, and so, when once he was supplying jewelry to V. Shantaram, something clicked between the two and the filmmaker offered him the role to play actress Sandhya’s body double in the 1959 project, Navrang. Jeetendra grabbed the opportunity, and rest, as they say, is history.
-Though Navrang had no impact on Jeetendra’s film career, V. Shantaram seemed to have been impressed by his good looks, and so, he cast him as the leading man in his 1964 venture, Geet Gaya Pattharon Ne. It was Shantaram who gave him the screen-name Jeetendra.
- Geet Gaya Pattharon Ne didn’t fare well at the box office, thus Jeetendra was still left with no success. The 1967 spy thriller Farz was the actor’s first commercial hit.
-Jeetendra was in love with the gorgeous actress Hema Malini once. He even proposed marriage to her, but she refused. He then went on to marry his childhood sweetheart, Shobha Kapoor.
-Interestingly, Jeetendra attended the same school where the late superstar Rajesh Khanna had studied – St. Sebastian’s Goan High School in Girgaum. What’s more, they both completed their graduation from the same college as well – K.C. College, Churchgate.
