Vinod Khanna: Family, Movies, Politics, Cause Of Death

Vinod Khanna was an actor, he was a producer, and also a politician in his native India, rising to become a minister. He made his name in films such as Kucche Dhaage, Amar Akbar Anthony, The Burning Train, and Kudrat, all between the late 1970s and early 1980s. But there were also hits in other times, even as late as 2017 when he passed away. Here are all the facts you need to know.

birth and early life

Vinod Khanna was born in October 1946 to Kamla and Krishanchand Khanna on 6 October 1946, in Peshawar, British India. Shortly after his birth, British India got its independent as two nations divided on the basis of hard religious lines – Hindu India and Muslim Pakistan. Peshawar is in Pakistan and as the Khannas were Hindus so they had to move. Overall, it wasn’t a peaceful movement, it was violent and caused hundreds of thousands of casualties sometimes put as high as two million deaths.

The Khannas were lucky to survive. They settled in Mumbai where the boy Vinod went on to attend St. Mary’s School, Mumbai. It was a moment of discovery for the family. When he was ten, his family moved to Delhi. It was here that he finished high school in Delhi Public School, Mathura Road. For university, Vinod returned to Mumbai and earned a degree in commerce in Sydenham College. It was in high school that he fell in love with moving pictures after seeing the legendary film from 1958 “Solva Saal” translated as sixteen years.

But he admitted that his first love was cricket and that he just wasn’t as sensational as Vishwanath the cricket legend, hence he wouldn’t have ended up in the film industry.

Vinod Khanna – Family

Vinod Khanna got married to Geetanjali Taleyarkhan in 1971. She was a woman he met and fell in love with at College. Geetanjali was a model. The marriage ended in divorce in 1985 shortly after Vinod quit acting and left his family for Rajneeshpuram to be with Osho Rajneesh, the fanatical and controversial leader of a religious movement that had a number of tenets but whose teachings on open sexuality became prominent and earned their founder the nickname of “sex guru”.

Vinod and Geetanjali had two sons together named Rarul and Akshaye Khanna.

Rahul is an actor in Bollywood. He was born in 1972 in Mumbai and studied at the School of Visual Arts in New York City. He made his debut in 1999 and it was so good he won Filmfare Best Male Debut Award. He has gone on to feature in a couple of movies and hosted a handful of television shows. He is also a writer who not only owns a blog but has written for a handful of media houses including Cosmopolitan, Times of India, Vogue India, and HuffPost India.

Rahul’s brother and Vinod’s second son Akshaye Khanna was born in March 1975 who made his debut in 1997 and is most known for starring in romantic comedies. He is the more successful actors of the Khanna sons. He has about four dozens of movies to his name. He is most known for his role in the romantic comedy “Hungama” which was a hit in the box office in India and abroad in 2003.

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Vinod remarried in 1990. His second wife is named Kavita Daftar and she bore him two children, a son named Sakshi Khanna and a daughter named Shraddha Khanna.

Vinod Khanna – movies

Vinod Khanna has part of Bollywood on and off (and mostly on) since 1968. According to IMDb, he has 150 credits to his name and only one of them came as a producer. All the rest were acting credits. There are one or two uncompleted and/or unreleased films, one or two Pakistani films. We can’t possibly name all his movie. And no, it is not just about us; you can’t possibly read all of them – no one can. So here are ten of his most prominent films.

List of notable films

1. “Man Ka Meet”, 1968, his debut film.

2. “Hum Tum Aur Woh”, 1971, his first break as a lead role player after making a name as an antagonistic player, a move only a few Indian actors have made.

3. “Mera Gaon Mera Desh”, 1971, a popular movie in which he played the role of a fugitive military man.

4. “Achanak”, 1972, an acclaimed film in which he played the role of Major Ranjeet Khanna, the film based on the popular drama and legal case involving a military man killed his wife’s lover.

5. “Haath Ki Safai”, 1974, the film in which he won the Filmfare award of Best Supporting Actor.

6. Hari Pheri, 1975, in playing the role of Ajay he was nominated to retain the award he won the previous year.

7. “Shaque”, 1976, for his role in this movie, he got the nomination for Best Actor Award.

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8. “Muqaddar Ka Sikandar”, 1978, nominated for Filmfare award for the best supporting actor for his role of Vishal Anand.

9. “Qurbani”, 1980, nominated for Filmfare Best Actor Award for his role as Amar.

10. “Insaaf”, 1987, his comeback film after his religious sojourn with Osho.

Vinod Khanna – politics

Vinod Khanna joined politics in 1997. He was elected to Lok Sabha, the lower chamber of their parliament to represent Gurdaspur constituency in Punjab, a state in Northern India. He was reelected in 1999 and 2004. He rose to become minister of culture and tourism in 2002 and was moved to the ministry of external affairs where he was made the junior minister in early 2003. He lost his seat in 2009.

He regained his seat in 2014 and remained in Lok Sobha till his death in 2017 aged 70.

Cause Of Death

Vinod Khanna died on April 27, 2017. His health began to deteriorate in early 2017. By the first week of April, he was hospitalized. on a case of severe dehydration. He was suffering from advanced cancer of the bladder. He might have been brought to the hospital too late. He died in Sir H.N. Reliance Foundation Hospital and Research Center in Girgaon, Mumbai less than four weeks after being in the hospital.

He was cremated at the Worli Crematorium.

Image source: Superstarsbio