Bina Rai

Bina Rai born on 4 June 1936 was a renowned Bollywood actress of the black and white time of Hindi cinema. Bina was mostly known for her characters she played in classic films like Anarkali, Taj Mahal, and won the Filmfare Award for Best Actress for her outstanding performance in the movie, Ghunghat. Before coming to Mumbai, the actress stayed in Kanpur.

She had to persuade her mother and father to allow her to opt acting as her career. Bina Raiwas a first year student of Arts in the Isabella Theodore College' of Lucknow in the year 1950, when she came to know about an advertisement that organised a talent contest. When she applied for the contest the sponsors of the show approached her. On the other hand Bina went Mumbai to take part in the contest where she bagged whooping amount, that time, of Rs. 25 thousand. Soon after that she made her first Bollywood debut with Kishore Sahu's project titled 'Kali Ghata' in the year 1951 opposite Kishore Sahu.

Somewhere in the 1950’s the actress married Bollywood star Prem Nath, whose sister Krishna tied the knot with Bollywood superstar and filmmaker Raj Kapoor. Bina Rai was paired up with Prem Nath before marriage in films like Aurat and Delilah. The couple within no time made their first film production house known by the name of P.N. Films. The first film made under the banner was Shagufa which got released in 1954 but the movie couldn’t run at the box office.

Neither Bina Rai’s charm nor Prem Nath’s thin-skinned depiction of the character of a doctor could set aside "Shagufa" from being a dud. And the movies that followed Shagufa were Prisoner of Golconda, Samunder and Watan vanished within couple of days. It is assumed that for these reasons the off-screen couple couldn’t impress the audiences with their on-screen thanda performance.

Bina Rai was later paired opposite actor Pradeep Kumar in films like Ghunghat, Anarkali, Taj Mahal respectively. In the 1970s, Bina’s son Prem Krishen became a star and gave a superhit film Dulhan Wohi Jo Piya Man Bhaye which got released in 1977. But he later on became a producer and launched his banner with the name Cinevista, and went on to produce small screen daily soaps like Kathasagar, Gul Gulshan Gulfam and Junoon. Bina Rai left the Hindi cinema many years ago. Her husband Prem Nath died on 3 November 1992. The actress as said died on 6th December, 2009.

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