User:Fowler&fowler/Sources in Dimple Kapadia

Fowler&fowler's Evidence for Sources, Paraphrasing, and Inference for FAC

I have examined the sources and inference in the Lead, sections 1, 2.1, 2.3, and 2.6 of Dimple Kapadia. Better ones are often available and their views are at variance with that of the article. The conclusions drawn are not always supported by the sources. Important details of DK's background, childhood (the makings of a child star), and marriage (the toxic relationship with her husband) are not made explicit. Unimportant details of adult life, such as DK's candle-making hobby, are dwelled on. Unfavorable views of DK are largely avoided, making the article complimentary in tone. Much is made of Indian film awards such as Filmfare which seem to be vanity awards. There is a dutiful enumeration of her films, which on account of her having made over 90, constitutes the bulk of the article. In the instances in which third-party (i.e. NY Times, for example) views are available, they seldom match those of the Indian sources. In the period 1985–2020, the Indian sources used seem to be given to adulation. I am adding the evidence below. I would request the nominator, or others, to comment either at the FAC or in the responses section in my post at Talk:Dimple Kapadia, but not here. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 04:14, 4 June 2020 (UTC)

Lead

1

• She went on to establish herself as one of the leading actresses of Hindi cinema in the 1980s. (cited to: [1] Bumiller, Elisabeth (1 June 1991). May You Be the Mother of a Hundred Sons. Penguin Books India. p. 185. ISBN 978-0-14-015671-3. The American edition is:

• a The source is reliable;

• b but it is inaccurately paraphrased: Bumiller says, "The Hindi commercial movie should not be confused with art films by directors like Satyajit Ray that are shown by film societies in New York, Paris, or Rome. ... The three leading commercial Indian actresses throughout the mid- and late 1980s were indisputably Rekha, Dimple Kapadia and Sridevi. ... no other commercial actress came close to touching their star quality." (pp 184-185)

Section 1

2

• "Chunibhai was from a wealthy Ismaili Khoja family, whose members had reportedly 'embraced Hinduism' without relinquishing Ismaili loyalties; Bitti was an Ismaili, too, and the couple followed Aga Khan as a religious mentor.

• a None of sources say anything about "Betty/Bitti being an Ismaili. However this is found in another source. Quote: "Inspired by her maternal grandmother, who would drag her to the Ismaili jamatkhana (community centre), Noni and her sister Binni were originally supporting characters in the novel she began writing as a teenager."

3

• Evaluation of the relevant quote in Mitra

• Quote: "But there was something oddly rebellious about Chunibhai himself, the scion of the family that owned the Killicks Nixon group of industries, ... The wealthy Khoja family, which embraced Hinduism only with Chunibhai's father, Laljibhai, and which accepts the Agha Khan as its religious mentor even now, disowned Dimple's father the day he agreed to Raj Kapoor's proposal to let her sign for Bobby."
• a The source is not reliable in this sentence for the following reasons b through e:.

• b The family that "owned" were the five Kapadia brothers. They had majority shares in Killick Nixon and Company, which they had acquired in 1965. They were the subject of numerous queries and discussions in the Indian Parliament (the lower house). The five brothers were 1. Maganlal Chhaganlal Kapadia 2. Popatlal Chhaganlal Kapadia 3. Mohanlal Chhaganlal Kapadia 4. Laljibhai Chhaganlal Kapadia 5. Nimjibhai Chhaganlal Kapadia. (See: )

• c The managing director of Killick from 1965 to 1976 was: Popatlal Chhaganlal Kapadia, see:

• (i) "In 1969 the Kapadia group was led by the shrewd and aggressive Popatlal Kapadia, who had already acquired control of the fund laden British Burma Petroleum Co Ltd (BBP) utilized ...
• (ii) "P. C. Kapadia (Managing Director. Registered Office: “Killick House", Charanjit Rai Marg, Fort Bombay-1" (See: here.; there are many others)

• d This death notice: "SHRI POPATLAL C. KAPADIA, well-known industrialist and Managing Director of Killick Nixon Ltd., expired on Sunday the 30th May 1976. Since a long time he was closely associated with the nationwide constructive renaissance programme of the Vishva Hindu Parishad, (See here.)

• e The VHP is the most militant of the Hindu nationalist organizations in India.) Does not jibe with a Khoja Muslim family which had embraced Hinduism but had continued to be Aga Khan IV's disciples/mentees.

4

• "When barely a month old, Dimple was given the name Ameena (literally, "honest" or "trustworthy" in Arabic) by Aga Khan III, although she was never referred to by it.") Quote: "I didn’t think about my name then. Dimple sounds a bit frivolous, it has no character. When my sister Simple and I’d travel together, officials at the airports would ask, “Are your names for real?” I suppose Dad had a crazy sense of humour. Actually, I was given another name by the present Aga Khan’s father. It was Ameena but no one ever called me that."

• a This citation and wording are in part my doing. The problem though is with the source, whether we can use it, and if so, use it in such paraphrasing.

• b We don't know that Dimple Kapadia was given that name, only that she has stated this.

• c Aga Khan III died one month and three days after DK's birth. She was born on June 8, 1957. According to the NY Times Obituary,, the Aga Khan was ailing for a long time at his villa in Versoix, a suburb of Geneva, having been flown there from Paris on June 18 to escape the heat. It is highly unlikely that he was in India in the preceding 10 days if heat it was he was staying away from.

• d So, howsoever she was given the name, it was very likely not in person. At the very least, therefore, it requires some clarification or finessing.

5

• The family resided in Santacruz, Bombay and she studied at St Joseph's Convent High School.)

• a Not in the source

• b It doesn't say anything about a family residing in Santacruz, only that, "Plucked out of obscurity, the St Joseph's Convent girl went from baby doll to trophy wife in one year. ... "If I had to do it all over again, I would still get married at 16," she says, seated in her Juhu home, ..."

• c It is actually another source that speaks of Santa Cruz: "My father was shaving in the balcony, he looked good. I was telling him that I want to be an actress. This is a very strong visual. I must have been five years old. We used to stay in Santa Cruz in Bombay, in a one-bedroom hall." (In Indian English, "stay" is legitimate use in the meaning of "live." (OED))

6

• There is a gap in the biography. It jumps straight to marriage and her first movie, Bobby (1973), but neglects the child star in the making

• a for example, the source in 5 tells us:

• b Mom would sing loris like "Chanda mama door ke" to us. Perhaps, she could have become an actress. It’s not that I became one because she couldn’t. It’s just that she was the asli (real) movie buff while dad liked to socialise with film people.
• c Sound recordist Manna Ladia and character actor Sundar were our neighbours. Dad was friendly with the Rawails, Rajendra Kumar, Joy Mukherji. Everyone said I could be a child star. Maybe that’s where it all started. The door to our house was open even when we shifted to Juhu. There was little privacy.
• d I was to play the kiddie version of Vyjayanthimala in H. S. Rawail’s Sunghursh. But tragically, I looked older than the junior Dilip Kumar. Actually, because of my tomboyish looks, it was felt I’d look older than Rishi Kapoor in Bobby. I nearly lost the role.
• e Bunny Reuben, says, " 'My contacts with the film industry began in the early sixties, ' Chunibhai Kapadia told me. 'At that time in the building where we were staying we had as our neighbours two film families: the comedian Sunder , and the music - director Roshan. Anjana Rawail during her lifetime had been a leading filmland socialite and very fond of hosting parties where everybody could get to know everybody else.' Once Anjana began to include Chunibhai in her parties he became a filmwallah too , though at this time only a peripheral one. Inevitably , when Dimple entered her teens, people in the film circles in which the Kapadias had begun to move started to eye her as a prospective candidate for stardom . In 1970 , for instance, Anjana Rawail offered Chunibhai the Guddi role for Dimple. Gulzar had written its script and they felt Dimple suited the role.
• f Dad’s father objected when Raj Kapoor chose me. Dad took him on and was thrown out of the family business.

7

• She retired from acting for eleven years to raise her two daughters, Twinkle (born 1974) and Rinke (born 1977). Reportedly, it was Khanna who disapproved of her acting career following the marriage, though Kapadia once noted that "career has always been secondary" to her.

• a from other more reliable sources:

• b Elisabeth Bumiller: "The film (Bobby) made Dimple into a sensation, but instead of using it to launch her career, she married, at the age of fifteen, the country's most popular leading man at the time, Rajesh Khanna. He promptly told his new wife that her acting days were over. 'My husband believed that my place was at home,' Dimple said. 'It was not a husband-wife relationship---it was father-daughter.' After two children and ten years of marriage, she finally walked out."
• c "But Kapadia’s success as a star was truncated by an early marriage to superstar Rajesh Khanna, a man twice her age who forbade her from working in the industry. Without understanding what her heady success really meant, the idea of being proposed to by the nation’s foremost superstar, she later recalled, was an even headier experience. After a courtship that lasted a week, she married, quit working in films, and by the end of three years had two daughters."

Section 2.1

8

• Bobby was a major mainstream and critical success, and Kapadia was lauded for her performance, which won her the Filmfare Award for Best Actress (tied with Jaya Bhaduri for Abhimaan).

• a It was box-office success to be sure, but it was a critical failure:

• b The editor of the Illustrated Weekly of India wrote in his end of the year editorial on December 30, 1973: "Every film critic has pronounced against it; the rating is either poor, below average, or just passable. Nevertheless, from all accounts Bobby is on its way to breaking box-office records. ... Why not make peace with yourself by admitting that we are a people with poor tastes which can only be catered to by second rate story-writers, ham actors and actresses and third-rate producer-directors who haven't an original idea in their heads." (See Editorial..

• c Who was the editor of the IWI? He was Khushwant Singh, whose Britannica page (he was that notable) says: "Khushwant Singh, Indian writer and journalist (born 1915, Hadali?, Punjab, British India [now in Pakistan]—died March 20, 2014, New Delhi, India), produced some of the most provocative and admired English-language fiction and nonfiction in post-World War II India. ... He served as editor of the Illustrated Weekly of India (1969–78) " (See here.)

• d See also Bernard Weinraub in his review in the NY Times 12 December, 1973: "The plot leans heavily on surging background music and profound, silent glances between Dimple and Rishi. 'The film is a sad reminder that the old moth-eaten formula of dream merchandising still works wonders with the masses,' said the critic for Shankar's Weekly of Bombay. 'Of course any resemblance here and there to Love Story and The Graduate must be purely accidental! But even such resemblance does not lend substance to the hackneyed rich-boy-meets-poor-girl theme.' (The critic was QH (see below))" See here.

• e "Kapoor followed this legendary flop with a 1973 box-office hit, “Bobby” (Sunday at 5:45 p.m. and Monday at 6:30 p.m.), in which he cast his son Rishi as a rich boy who falls in love with the family maid’s granddaughter (Dimple Kapadia), frustrating his family’s plans to marry him off to a mentally impaired heiress. Ah, Bollywood!" In Retrospective of Raj Kapoor 1948 to 1973: Museum of Modern Art, by David Kehr.

9

• Qurratulain Hyder of The Illustrated Weekly of India noted that she acted with "natural ease and freshness".

• a Qurratulain Hyder in her review in the IWI, October 14, 1973, actually says a bit more (in addition to repeating what she said in Shankar's Weekly above): "Rishi and Dimple act with natural ease and freshness. Had Dimple not married you-know-who in such a hurry, she might have turned out to be an actress of considerable talent." and in the caption, "Bobby ... remains pointless in the true tradition of Hindi films. The public is flocking to see the film because they want to know what the much publicised Mrs Rajesh Khanna looks like on the screen." (See )

• b And who is QH? Her Britannica page (she too is that notable) says: "Qurratulain Hyder, ... Indian writer, editor, scholar, and translator who helped the novel become a serious genre of hitherto poetry-oriented Urdu literature. Her masterwork, Aag ka darya (1959; River of Fire), has been compared to those of Colombian novelist Gabriel García Márquez and Czech novelist Milan Kundera." (See here.)

Section 2.3

10

• Much is made in the article of awards, e.g. Filmfare Awards. Here is another view of them:

• a From NY Times: "Bollywood’s Oscar obsession could be linked to the fact that the industry’s own awards ceremonies are increasingly eyed with suspicion. The Filmfare Awards and the state-sponsored National Film Awards have both been around since 1954. But the Filmfare Awards, once considered truly independent, are now widely seen as vanity prizes, doled out to popular stars to get them to appear at the awards ceremony. Dimple Kapadia’s performance at the 1993 Filmfare Awards added fuel to the rumors: When presenting the prize for best actor, she famously walked up to the stage and made the announcement without even opening the sealed, “secret” envelope."

Section 2.6 (2000s)

11

• (Leela) "In 2002, Kapadia portrayed the title role in the drama Leela, an American production directed by Somnath Sen and co-starring ... Reviews in India were similarly approving, with The Hindu finding her condition to be "enticingly vulnerable"."

• The Hindu review is so full of adulation that it strains credulity as film criticism (e.g. DIMPLE KAPADIA is a very special woman who carries herself with rare dignity. ... Here in Leela ... she is a charmer all the way. Exhilarating is the air she breathes, bewitching is the glance she casts and enticingly vulnerable is her condition.... With her poise and polish, she makes you yearn and pine. Driven by the tide of time, perfidy stares her in the face."

• In contrast, David Kehr, "Leela, played by the veteran Bollywood actress Dimple Kapadia (Saagar), is a visiting professor who arrives at the university in a swirl of pastel saris, tossing her raven locks with appropriate imperiousness. Much of Leela, which opens today follows the line of the immigrant melodramas of the 1920's and 30's. The old-country parents see their Americanized offspring as selfish, ungrateful and unappreciative of their cultural heritage; the children see their parents as hopelessly square. But unlike, say, the Yiddish-language melodramas of the early 30's, Leela acknowledges that America might have something to offer the old world, too. As directed and written by Somnath Sen, Leela veers between the light naturalism of American television and the pulsing melodrama of Bollywood entertainment."

Fowler&fowler«Talk» 04:14, 4 June 2020 (UTC)

Section 2.1 (cont)

I forgot to add one sentence from section 2.1 which makes claims about a fashion culture that did not exist in India:

12 (section 2.1)

• "Several of her lines in the film became popular, particularly, "Mujhse dosti karoge?" ("Will you be my friend?"), and the "miniskirts, midriff-baring polka dot shirts, and fabled red bikini" she wore made her a youth fashion icon of the times in India.

• i The source Joshi from which this quote is taken, says: "Dimple Kapadia's miniskirts, midriff-baring polka dot shirts, and her fabled red bikini were visual enticements of an audacious teenage sexuality hitherto unseen on Bombay's screens," which stays away from implying that such a fashion culture existed in India.

• ii The source Raheja which is also cited makes retrospective claims about Kapadia in Bobby and about an attendant fashion culture which is at variance with what had existed in India, often even with what has continues to exist. Says Raheja: "Her expressive eyes effectively conveyed teen angst. And when she emerged nymph-like from the pool in a red bikini, Dimple, despite her puppy fat, had teenagers enthralled. Her knotted polka-dotted blouse and earphone hairstyle were wildly emulated."

• iii Contrast this with Murray Pomerance in his book Where the boys are: Cinemas of Masculinity and Youth "Bobby starred the director's son Rishi as the eighteen-year-old Raj and the newcomer Dimple Kapadia as sixteen-year-old Bobby, whose Christian character allowed her to appear in a famous bikini. ... Although Rachel Dwyer and Divia Patel acknowledge that Bobby “epitomized youth culture and 1960s fashions,” they also tellingly note that its psychedelic poster “was not implying that this culture existed in India, rather it alluded to a period associated with youth culture, fun, romance, and rebellion” (2002, 169). This is a subtle distinction but seems accurate insofar as it describes the depiction of an “international” youth culture that seems more borrowed or quoted than fully assimilated."

• iv See also Dwyer and Patel, who say: " The Hindi cinema's most controversial outfit is the swimsuit, popular in films of Raj Kapoor, whether his Awara (1951) or Bobby (1973), but deemed unsuitable for a round in the Miss World contest held in India in 1996."

Fowler&fowler«Talk» 12:31, 4 June 2020 (UTC) Updated. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 19:34, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

References