February 28, 2017
Actor-filmmaker Satish Kaushik says after the sudden demise
of actress Sridevi, her husband and producer Boney Kapoor couldnt stop crying.
Sridevi passed away following an accidental drowning in a bathtub in her
hotel room in Dubai around 11 p.m. on February 24.
"When I heard of
ma'am's (Sridevi) death, I couldn't believe it. Boney and I have been friends
for 30 years. I called him up. He wept inconsolably. The more we spoke, the more
he wept. He just couldn't stop crying. I hung up," said Satish.
Warm,
loving, vivacious and a complete actor is how he describes the "Sadma" star.
"I don't know of anyone who could transform so much once she had make-up
on," he said.
"And I don't mean just for the camera. She could dress up
for a wedding and she'd look like a different person…And now to see her lying
there still and unmoving in that casket...it was heartbreaking," he said after
paying his last respects to the star here on Wednesday.
Boney and Satish
go back a long way.
"I was serving as an assistant on Shekhar Kapur's
'Joshilaay' which Boney produced. This was way back in 1988. I saw Sridevi in
'Himmatwala' and I was stunned by her screen presence.
"Javed Akhtar saab
recommended her very strongly. She was signed for the female lead of 'Joshilaay'
along with Anil Kapoor, Sunny Deol and Meenakshi Seshadri. Sridevi played a
village belle, a circus owner's daughter and her comic timing was impeccable
even back then."
After that, he again got a chance to work with her when
she did "Mr. India".
When she chose a role she embraced it
wholeheartedly.
"In her later years, she chose the real-life role of a
mother to Janhvi and Khushi. That was her favourite role and the one that she
played oblivious to the fact that there was no camera," said Satish.
"I've seen what a good mother she was to the two girls. And now to see Janhvi
and Khushi looking so lost without her…"
In terms of sheer numbers,
Sridevi's funeral is estimated to have attracted the highest number of mourners,
ranking at par with the previous biggest funeral processions of the legendary
singer Mohammed Rafi (July 1980: around a million mourners), and India's first
superstar Rajesh Khanna (July 2012: a little less than a million mourners).
"I've never seen so many people at anyone's condolence meet or funeral.
There was not a dry eye to be seen. Her going away has affected everyone, even
those who had never met her. The nation is in grief," said Satish.
In
the past four days since her demise, the Kapoor household had witnessed a steady
stream of visitors including Rajinikanth, Kamal Haasan, Shah Rukh Khan, Salman
Khan and Krishna Raj Kapoor.
Most of the visitors on Wednesday
were sporting dark sunglasses to ward off the harsh early-summer glare, carrying
flowers or small bouquets, embraced and consoled the bereaved family members,
entering from the main entrance and leaving quickly from the other side as fans
tried to catch a glimpse.
Sridevi's body was flown to Mumbai from
Dubai where she passed away following an accidental drowning in a bathtub in her
hotel room around 11 pm on February 24, and from the airport was taken to the
Kapoor residence in Green Acres.