KIRON KHER

Born on June 14, 1955, the actress has her roots in theatre. Kiron Kher, the wife of Anupam Kher, actually, began her career as a television host before moving on to Hindi films. Her first film was a Punjabi one, Aasra Pyar Da, made in 1983. Then came her first major role in Shyam Benegal's Sardari Begum, where she played the main role of the singer.




EARLY LIFE:

Kirron Kher was born in Mumbai to Jatt Sikh parents, and brought up in Chandigarh, Punjab, where she did her schooling and later college from Panjab University, Chandigarh. At school she was an avid Badminton player along with her sister, Arjuna awardee Kanwal Thakar Singh, their mother Diljit Singh was also active in sports and dramatics in in her college days in pre-partition Punjab. Kirron also had a brother, painter Amardeep Singh, who passed away in 2003.

In 2000, she appeared in film director, Rituparno Ghosh's Bengali film Bariwali 1999, to critical acclaim. Though when she won the National Film Award for Best Actress for the film.

Her first marriage was with actor and businessman, Gautam Berry, with whom she has a son, actor Sikander Kher, before they divorced in 1985. She then married actor Anupam Kher, who she first met at Department of Indian Theatre in Chandigarh in 1974, which had Balwant Gargi has its head, though after which Anupam Kher went to Delhi and joined National School of Drama (NSD), while Kirron went to Bombay and got married to her first husband, subsequently they met while working together in a play called Chanadpuri Ki Champabai, and married in 1985, now they together run a production house.

In 2002, she appeared in Devdas (2002) alongside Shahrukh Khan, Madhuri Dixit and Aishwarya Rai, and was nominated for the Filmfare Best Supporting Actress Award.

It was followed by Darmiyaan (1997) also made in the same year. In between the years, 1988 to 1996, she decided to concentrate on bringing up her son, Sikander, and stayed away from films.

But after the sabbatical, she came back with a bang with films like Rituparno Ghosh's Bariwali, which won her a National Award for Best Actress. In 2003, she won an international award at the Locarno Film Festival for her role in the Pakistani film Khamosh Paani. She followed it with a fiery performance in Sanjay Leela Bhansali's Devdas for which she won a best supporting actress award from Filmfare.

Kiron has also won accolades for her many successful portrayals of mother and wife in innumberable films like Main Hoon Na (2004), Hum Tum (2004), Veer-Zaara (2004). Rang De Basanti, Fanaa (2006), Kabhi Alvida Naa Kehna (2006), Om Shanti Om (2007), Saas Bahu Aur Sensex and Singh Is Kinng (2008). Besides her flair for histrionics, the actress is also known to have a mindboggling collection of sarees and generally wears her own saris in films.

In 2003, she changed her name from "Kiron" to "Kirron" due to beliefs in numerology.

She has been casted in 24 films, as a costume designer in 1 film and special appearance in 1 film.