Pamela Rooks

Pamela Rooks Biography

Pamela Rooks was a Bollywood director and prolific documentary film maker, most remembered for the movie, Train to Pakistan (1998) based on Khushwant Singh’s historical novel with the same title. This movie was based on India partition in 1947 and events associated with it. Miss Beatty's Children (1992) and Dance Like a Man (2003) are other noted works which won many international awards. Apart from a film director, she is also known as a screenwriter. But unfortunately this talented young director died at a comparatively young age of 52, following a car accident. She was in coma stage in the last 5 years battling with life.

She started her career as journalist and has also been involved with theater activities at a younger age. She has been associated with Doordarshan in the early 1970’s as a program producer. Once she interviewed famous director, Conrad Rooks of Siddhartha fame, for a television program. Later they got married. As a theater artist, she was associated with Theatre Action Group, based on Delhi.

Later she turned a documentary filmmaker and did many award winning documentary films like Chipko: A response to the forest crisis, Girl Child: fighting for survival, Punjab: a human tragedy and Indian cinema: the winds of change. She made her first full-length movie in the year 1992 titled, Miss Beatty's Children which won Indira Gandhi Award for Best First Film of a Director at the National Film Awards. Her major breakthrough was the movie, Train to Pakistan released in 1998. It was the best feature film done based on the historic novel written by Khushwant Singh. Though it faced some troubles, the movie was able to clear censor board after a few cuts. Dance like a Man won a National Award for the Best Film in English for 2003.

In November 2005, she met with a serious accident and went to coma following a brain injury. She died on October 1, 2010 at the age of 52 following a cardiac arrest.

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Updated: April 17, 2014