The quaint little village of Bharowal, located in the foothills of the Shiwaliks in Hoshiarpur district of Punjab shot to fame when veteran Bollywood actor Pran Krishan Sikand said it was his ancestral home in the film, ‘Lakhon Mein Ek’.
Pran had played the role of a truck driver in the movie and identifies himself as Sher Singh from Bharowal village, in a scene.
On Friday, when the news of his death reached the villagers, they gathered at his ancestral house and a palm of gloom descended on the village. The veteran actor’s family left the house and shifted to Delhi in 1975.
His childhood friend Hari Singh, 93, recalls that Pran was a large hearted man. “He was since childhood interested in acting and photography and used to tell me that he will be actor or photographer one day. He was very witty and full of life,” said Singh.
Another villager says, “We knew he belonged to the village, but as he had hardly visited the village the new generations do not know that he belonged to this village. His connection with the village broke once his family shifted.”
His family never got in touch to their roots, but his close relatives and cousins were in touch and visited the village many times, said Dharminder Singh, another villager.
Born in 1920, his real name was Pran Kishan Sikand,and he debutted in 1940 in the Punjabi movie ‘Yamla Jat’. In a career spanning six decades, he featured in more than 350 films, including blockbusters such as Zanjeer, Don and Amar Akbar Anthony. He was one of the highest-paid Bollywood actors in the 70s and 80s.