Rohini Hathangadi

Rohini Hathangadi Biography

Rohini Hathangadi is a versatile actress of Indian cinema as well as drama – the only Indian actress who was fortunate to win BAFTA Awards for best actress in supporting role for the masterpiece Gandhi. When this movie was released it was critically acclaimed and it accumulated a large number of awards. Rohini’s award has a special space, no doubt.

Born in Pune she did her schooling from Renuka Swaroop Memorial Girls High School. From the childhood itself she was interested in theatres than cinemas. That’s the reason why she didn’t join Film and Television Institute of India of her home town Pune. In 1971 she joined the National school of Drama at New Delhi where she learnt primary lessons of acting. Yet destination was something else. She did a few memorable roles of Indian cinema. She is a trained dancer of south Indian art forms – Kathakali and Bharatnaytam.

She started her acting career through theater. In 1975, she won the best actress award for drama Changuna. She was the first woman to act in Kannada play Yakshagana. Her other notable theatre works are Hori, Kohra, Mitra Chi Gosht, Mahayagya and Imthehan. Along with her husband Hathangadi, Rohini started an institute to promote art and new talents.

She debut in Bollywood in critically acclaimed movie of 1978, Aravind Desai ki ajeeb dasthan. This movie was directed by Saeed Akhtar Misra and very soon, he casted her for his next movie Albert Pinto Ko Gussa Kyon Ata Hai. This movie was also critically well acclaimed. Following these two movies, she acted in character roles for movies Chakra and Gandhi. Gandhi proved to be the milestone movie of her career where she acted the role of Kasthurba Gandhi. But it brought some negative impulses to her career as well. She was only 27 when she acted as Kasthurba. But after her success in the movie, she began to get aged roles only.

After that she worked in a few movies for which she got supporting actress award both in filmfare as well as National awards. In 1982, she won her first film fare award for Arth. In 1984, she won national awards for her memorable role in Party. But she was type casted as aged mother for her movies later. Saransh and Mohan Joshi Hazir Ho come under this category. In Chalbaaz she did the negative role in a comic style. In 1991, she got her second filmfare for her wonderful performance in Agnipath as Big B’s mother. Later she has acted in a few movies including Pukar, Munna Bhai MBBS, Vassol Raja, Damini and Ghatak.

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Updated: April 23, 2013