Real star shines brighter

Film stars, especially super stars, be it of the current era or golden era enjoy so much adulation. They have a fan following everywhere that they go. And they wrongly start assuming that the whole world revolves only for them and every living organism knows, recognizes them. What we also see is that they are so much into their own world that they forget there are other super stars too!

We narrate a small incidence which happened years ago, almost history. Dilip Kumar himself narrated this incidence. He was at his peak and adulation followed him everywhere. One day, he was travelling by plane,  and the passenger sitting next to him was an elderly. Dressed in a very simple bush shirt and pant, his apparel projected a middle class upbringing to the star. He appeared well educated. Passengers on the plane were walking by them, catching glances of the super star. Yet, the gentleman next to him was immersed in his newspaper, once in a while, looking out of the window.  When tea was served, he took some and sipped, without paying any attention to Dilip Kumar.

Dilip Kumar felt uneasy. Trying to strike a conversation, he smiled at the man. The man smiled back. . Slowly he spoke a few things about the weather and other sundry things and veered the conversation to films.

He asked the man, “Do you watch films?”

The man said, “On just a very few. I did see one many years ago.”

Dilip Kumar mentioned casually that he also worked with the film industry.

The man: “Oh, that’s nice. What do you do?”

Dilip Kumar: “I am a  film actor.”

Man: “Oh wonderful! “

And that was that. There was no further conversation and the man returned to his newspaper.

The flight landed soon after and both stood to leave. Dilip Kumar held out his hand and said, “It was good to travel with you. By the way, my name is Dilip Kumar.”

The man shook his hand and smiled, saying, “Thank you. I am JRD Tata.”