Was The Queen Of Bollywood Murdered?
The Australian Women's Weekly|May 2018

A beautiful film star, a luxury hotel, a troubled marriage. The mysterious death of actress Sridevi Kapoor reads like a movie script, but, as William Langley reports, the truth is much more intriguing.

William Langley
Was The Queen Of Bollywood Murdered?

As the afternoon sun slipped behind the glitzy glass towers of Dubai, Sridevi Kapoor, the long-reigning “Queen of Bollywood”, was getting ready for a surprise night out.

Sridevi had just received an unexpected caller at her suite, 22 floors up in the Jumeirah Emirates Towers Hotel, the city’s tallest, with spectacular views over the Persian Gulf. She disliked being alone, especially in a place like Dubai, where she knew nobody and found the hectic pace of life unsettling. But here, astonishingly, was her husband, 62-year-old Boney Kapoor, a prolific Indian film producer and the mastermind behind her enduring stardom. Knowing his wife would be unhappy, Boney explained later, he’d secretly flown 2000 kilometres from the couple’s Mumbai home to be with her. The pair fell into each others arms “like teenagers,” he said, and agreed to go out for a romantic dinner.

First, though, Sridevi needed to get ready. By all accounts, this was never a quick process. The Bollywood beauty-standard for actresses is perfection, and even at 54 with 300 films to her name, Sridevi took an unsparing approach to looking her best. 

While she was busy in the bathroom, Boney poured himself a drink and settled down to watch an India-v-South Africa cricket match on the television. He says he isn’t sure how long it was before he called to her. There was no answer. The door was locked. He tried to force the handle, and eventually kicked it open. Sridevi was lying dead in the bathtub.

This story is from the May 2018 edition of The Australian Women's Weekly.

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This story is from the May 2018 edition of The Australian Women's Weekly.

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