Starcast: Rajesh Khanna, Mumtaz, Vinod Khanna, Faryal, Naaz, Kamal Kapoor, Dog Rexy Director: Manmohan Desai Music: Kalyanji Anandji T...
Starcast: Rajesh Khanna, Mumtaz, Vinod Khanna, Faryal, Naaz, Kamal Kapoor, Dog Rexy
Director: Manmohan Desai
Music: Kalyanji Anandji
This year marks 55 years of the blockbuster Sachaa Jhutha and Rajesh Khanna's golden period of box office runs. This was the film from where there was no looking back for Manmohan Desai, and went on to become one of the biggest directors of the Hindi film industry after its release on May 1, 1970.
Shashi Kapoor was initially cast
as the leading man, but he did not want to work with the leading lady, who was a
B-grade actress, according to him. The lady in question was Mumtaz (ironically, one of Shashi Kapoor’s biggest hits was Chor Machaye Shor starring
Mumtaz as the leading lady), who went on to become the top heroine during her
time and gave 6 blockbusters with Rajesh Khanna out of the 8 in which they
worked together.
Bhola (Rajesh Khanna), a
bandmaster comes to Bombay in search of a living so that he could marry off his
crippled sister Belu (Naaz). But in a turn of events, he is spotted by Ranjit
Kumar (Rajesh Khanna) who is supposed to be the top smuggler, at a fancy dress
party organised by the Commissioner of Police (Kamal Kapoor) along with CID
inspectors Pradhan (Vinod Khanna) and Rita ( Mumtaz). Ranjit takes Bhola with
him to his palatial house and gives him a job saying that Bhola had to take the
place of Ranjit when the latter is away for work . In the meantime Bhola gets
involved with Rita who thinks he is Ranjit Kumar. In the end, in one of the
most famous court scene, Moti (dog Rexy) solves the riddle of who is Sachaa
(Bhola) and who is Jhutha (Ranjit Kumar).
Rajesh Khanna looked dashing and debonair as Ranjit Kumar and played the suave villain with aplomb. His arrogance and cunning but sophisticated attitude lent credence to the role. Distinctly opposite was Bhola who was played the village simpleton with utmost ease. His innocence was lapped up by the audience and no wonder Rajesh Khanna got the Filmfare Award for the Best Actor (there was a controversy though) for his two roles, which was as different from each other as chalk and cheese. Mumtaz as usual, had a role full of meat and she was excellent. Her dance number (Karle pyar karle) was superb. Vinod Khanna in a positive role looks handsome and plays the supporting role. Naaz as Belu and Faryal as Ranjit’s moll, Ruby shine in their respective roles. As Moti the Doberman, Dog Rexy takes the cake.
Music played a huge role in making this film a super hit. Kalyanji Anandji gave one of the biggest hits ever in “Meri pyari beheniya’ sung by Kishore Kumar which is still till date heard in marriage parties. ‘Dil saccha aur cheraa jhutha’ was another gem sung by Kishore Kumar. The Lata-Rafi duet “Yunhi tum mujhe pyar karte ho” was and is still popular. The least heard song was the Kishore-Lata duet “Kehdo kehdo” but it is still worth a hearing. Sachaa Jhutha remains one of the biggest hits of Rajesh Khanna and Manmohan Desai used lots of gimmick (dog, crippled sister, double role, remembrance song) in the film. For once there were no identical twins or long-lost brothers. Even today the film is watched on OTT and has attained the status of a cult classic.
The Mithun Chakraborty starrer and Ashim Samanta directed Aamne Saamne (1982) was a direct lift. In Tamil it was remade in 1975 as Ninaithadhai Mudippavan with MG Ramachandra essaying a double role. Even the Mahesh Bhatt - Shah Rukh Khan’s Duplicate (1988) was inspired by Sachaa Jhutha.
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