EXCLUSIVE: Mumtaz recalls her first day on sets of Ram Aur Shyam when she had to hit Dilip Kumar

Mumtaz is happy that a film fest is being organised in honour of Dilip Kumar, and to mark his 100th birth anniversary.

Written by Avinash Lohana , Journalist

Updated on Nov 28, 2022 | 08:24 PM IST | 504.1K

EXCLUSIVE: Mumtaz recalls her first day on sets of Ram Aur Shyam when she had to hit Dilip Kumar (Pic Credit: Eros Now Music / YouTube)

Pinkvilla was the first to report that after celebrating Amitabh Bachchan’s 80th birthday in October with a four day film festival - ‘Bachchan: Back To The Beginning’, Film Heritage Foundation’s (FHF) Shivendra Singh Dungarpur is now organising a movie festival in honour of Dilip Kumar, to mark the late actor’s 100th birth anniversary. FHF recently made it official by announcing that the festival will be held in December, and has been titled - ‘Dilip Kumar Hero Of Heroes’. Now, Dilip Kumar’s Ram Aur Shyam co-star Mumtaz expresses her excitement about the fest.

“Yusuf Saheb - what can I say about him as an artist? The whole world knows he was one of the best. He was a wonder of the world. I am so happy that the Film Heritage Foundation is celebrating his 100th birthday with a festival of films under the title “Hero Of Heroes”, and bringing films from our time back to the cinemas. I still remember when I worked with Yusuf Saheb on Ram Aur Shyam - the first day of the shoot my first shot was with him - and I had to hit him. I was so nervous, but he told me I should not worry and hit him hard as we were professionals and we must be absolutely natural,” recalls the veteran actress.

Mumtaz on Film Heritage Foundation’s efforts

Mumtaz also applauds FHF’s efforts to conserve, preserve and restore these yesteryear classics. “I had done two Bhojpuri films with Sujit Kumar and I would like people to see how fluently I spoke Bhojpuri, even though it was not a language I knew very well. I wanted to see once again how I performed in these films all these years later, but I am not able to find these films. Saving our film heritage is very important. If we don’t save our films, the generations to come will not know about the stars and the films that were made in our time,” she states.

‘Dilip Kumar Hero Of Heroes’ is slated to be hosted on December 10 and 11.

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