The hero who made the movies larger

There are so many Dharmendras to love. Our tribute to the actor whose casual charm belied his larger-than-life aura

- Raja Sen

He was the first person to give me an autograph.

I was eight. I had handed Dharmendra a notebook with a novelty cover that made it look like a sandwich, and in his massive hand, this looked like a crouton. He smiled as he signed it, and I stared. This gorgeous 50-something man wore a black sleeveless shirt, showing off the kind of sculpted arms I only knew from my action figures, and was instantly unforgettable. He had an immense aura but wore it casually, a giant nonchalantly larger than life. A giant who knows he's a giant. An aunt who sang in the movies had taken the family to a filmi function, and I was seated next to Dharamji. (This marked the only time in my life that my mother was envious of me.)

Decades later, he tweeted at me. I had co-written the 2022 film Chup with R. Balki, and Sunny Deol was a part of the film. The day the trailer launched Dharmendra posted about it saying "Yakeenan yeh ek khamosh cheekh hogi" and wishing the crew the best, to which one of his fans posted about his "guest appearance" in the 1969 film Khamoshi and the sublime song Tum Pukar Lo, where Dharmendra is never fully glimpsed. Several months later, Dharmendra replied to the fan: "I am the hero of film Khamoshi."

This is an odd, unexpected clarification. Khamoshi stars Waheeda Rehman as a nurse in the psychiatric ward of a hospital, while Dharmendra plays a patient (Patient No.42). He is the romantic hero she idealises in her head, but Rajesh Khanna is—traditionally—the film's leading man. Dharmendra's presence is striking, and the way he flits through the song Tum Pukar Lo, showing his gait and his silhouette and the back of his head, is magical. For him to feel the need to correct a fan, after all these years, about this hierarchy, may seem strange. It does vividly demonstrate one thing: a refusal to be forgotten.