1.
Govinda (actor)
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Govind Arun Kumar Ahuja, known mononymously as Govinda, is an Indian film actor, comedian and former politician known for his work in Hindi films. Known for his skills, Govinda has received twelve Filmfare Award nominations, a Filmfare Special Award, a Filmfare Award for Best Comedian. The actor was a member of the Parliament of India from 2004 to 2009. Govindas first film was 1986s Ilzaam, in June 1999, He was voted the tenth-greatest star of stage or screen in a BBC News Online poll. During the 1980s, Govindas films spanned genres and included family, drama, action and he started out as an action hero in the 80s and reinvented himself as a comedy hero in 90s. At one time, Amitabh co-starred with him on his comeback to rejuvenate his market when his films failed miserably. He was recognised the decade as a comic actor after playing a mischievous young NCC cadet in the 1992 romance Shola Aur Shabnam. Govinda had lead roles in commercially successful comedy films, including Aankhen, Raja Babu. 1, Hero No.1 and Haseena Maan Jaayegi and he received a Filmfare Best Comedian Award for Haseena Maan Jayegi and a Filmfare Special Award for Saajan Chale Sasural. Govinda has played roles in several movies, including Jaan Se Pyaara, Aankhen, Bade Miyan Chote Miyan. He played six roles in Hadh Kar Di Aapne, Raju, after a number of box-office flops in the 2000s, his later commercial successes included Bhagam Bhag, Partner, Life Partner etc. In 2015 Govinda became a judge on Zee TVs dance-based reality show, Dance India Dance Super Mom Season 2, the show received the highest TRP of any reality-show opening episode. Govinda was elected the member of parliament for the Mumbai North constituency of Maharashtra, India in the 14th Lok Sabha elections in 2004. Govinda was born on 21 December 1963 to former actor Arun Kumar Ahuja and singer-actress Nirmala Devi into a family with Punjabi, Arun is best known for Mehboob Khans Aurat. He produced one film, and became ill shortly afterwards. The family, living in a bungalow on Mumbais Carter Road, the youngest of six children, he was given the pet name Chi Chi, meaning little finger in Punjabi, the language spoken at home. After Govinda received a Bachelor of Commerce degree, his father suggested a career in film, around this time, Govinda saw the film Disco Dancer, afterwards, he practised for hours and circulated a promotional VHS cassette. He was offered jobs in a commercial and an Allwyn ad. His first lead role was in Tan-Badan, directed by his uncle Anand, Govinda began shooting for his next film, Love 86, in June 1985
2.
Hema Malini
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Hema Malini is an Indian actress, director, producer, dancer and politician. 1963 she made acting debut in Tamil film Ithu Sathiyam as a dancer resp, Malini first acted in main role in Sapno Ka Saudagar, and went on to feature in numerous Bollywood films, primarily as the lead actress. In most of her films, she starred opposite her husband, Dharmendra and with Rajesh Khanna, Malini was initially promoted as the Dream Girl, and in 1977 starred in a film of the same name. She has played both comic and dramatic roles, as well as being a dancer and she has appeared in more than 150 films. During her career, Malini received eleven nominations for the Filmfare Award for Best Actress, in 2000, Malini won the Filmfare Lifetime Achievement Award and also the Padma Shri, the fourth-highest civilian honour awarded by the Government of India. In 2012, the Sir Padampat Singhania University conferred an Honorary Doctorate on Malini in recognition of her contribution to Indian cinema, Malini served as chairperson of the National Film Development Corporation. In 2006, Malini received Sopori Academy of Music And Performing Arts Vitasta award from Bhajan Sopori in Delhi for her contribution and service to Indian culture, in 2013, she received the NTR National Award from Government of Andhra Pradesh for her contribution to Indian cinema. From 2003 to 2009, Malini was elected to the Rajya Sabha, in 2014, Malini was elected to the Lok Sabha. Malini has been involved with charitable and social ventures, currently, Malini is also a life member of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness. She was the top and successful actress of her time and she has been praised by critics for dancing and acting skills. Malini was the child born of a Tamil family to her mother Jaya Lakshmi Chakravarti. Malini attended the Andhra Mahila Sabha in Chennai where her favourite subject was History, Malini studied at DTEA Mandir Marg and in 12th Standard left to begin her acting career. Malinis first film with Dharmendra was Sharafat, and they got married in 1979, Dharmendra was already married at the time and had children, two of whom are Bollywood actors Sunny Deol and Bobby Deol. Malini converted to Islam and married Dharmendra and they have two children, Bollywood actress Esha Deol and Ahana Deol, an assistant director. Malinis niece is actress Madhoo who played the lead in Phool Aur Kaante, Roja. Malini was a supporting artiste in Idhu Sathiyam and portrayed a danseuse in Pandava Vanavasam, in 1968, Malini played opposite Raj Kapoor in Sapno Ka Saudagar. That was the beginning of her promotion as the Bollywood dream girl, in Johnny Mera Naam, Malini took a lead role and she took other challenging roles, for example, a young widow in Andaz and a poor woman in Lal Patthar. In 1972, Malini played opposite Dharmendra and Sanjeev Kumar in Seeta Aur Geeta, Malini received a Filmfare Best Actress Award for this film
3.
Cinema of India
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The cinema of India consists of films produced across India. Cinema as a medium has gained popularity in the country. Indian films have come to be followed throughout South Asia. Dadasaheb Phalke is known as the father of Indian cinema, the Dadasaheb Phalke Award, for lifetime contribution to cinema, was instituted in his honour, by the Government of India in 1969, and is the most prestigious and coveted award in Indian cinema. In the 20th century, Indian cinema, along with the Hollywood and Chinese film industries, as of 2013, in terms of annual film output, India ranks first, followed by Nollywood, Hollywood and China. In 2012, India produced 1,602 feature films, the Indian film industry reached overall revenues of $1.86 billion in 2011. This is projected to rise to $3 billion in 2016, in 2015, India had a total box office of US$1.6 billion, the fourth largest in the world outside North America. Enhanced technology paved the way for upgrading from established norms of delivering product. Visual effects based, super hero science fiction, and epic films like Enthiran, Baahubali, Indian cinema found markets in over 90 countries where films from India are screened. The Indian government extended film delegations to countries such as the United States of America. The provision of 100% foreign direct investment has made the Indian film market attractive for foreign enterprises such as 20th Century Fox, Sony Pictures, Walt Disney Pictures, tax incentives to multiplexes have aided the multiplex boom in India. By 2003 as many as 30 film production companies had been listed in the National Stock Exchange of India, the South Indian film industry defines the four film cultures of South India as a single entity. They are the Tamil, the Telugu, the Malayalam and the Kannada industries, although developed independently over a long period, gross exchange of film performers and technicians as well as globalisation helped to shape this new identity. Music in Indian cinema is another substantial revenue generator with the music rights alone accounting for 4–5% of the net revenues generated by a film in India. Following the screening of the Lumière moving pictures in London, cinema became a sensation across Europe, in the next year a film presentation by one Professor Stevenson featured a stage show at Calcuttas Star Theatre. With Stevensons encouragement and camera Hiralal Sen, an Indian photographer, made a film of scenes from that show, the Wrestlers by H. S. Bhatavdekar showing a wrestling match at the Hanging Gardens in Bombay was the first film ever to be shot by an Indian. It was also the first Indian documentary film, the first Indian film released in India was Shree Pundalik a silent film in Marathi by Dadasaheb Torne on 18 May 1912 at Coronation Cinematograph, Bombay. The female roles in the film were played by male actors, the film marked a historic benchmark in the film industry in India
4.
Asha Bhosle
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Asha Bhosle, is an Indian singer. She is best known as a singer in Hindi cinema. Bhosles career started in 1943 and has spanned six decades. She has done playback singing for over a thousand Bollywood movies, in addition, she has recorded several private albums and participated in numerous solo concerts in India and abroad. Bhosle is the sister of playback singer Lata Mangeshkar, apart from Hindi, she has sung in over 20 Indian and foreign languages. In 2006, Asha Bhosle stated that she had sung over 12,000 songs, in 2011, she was officially acknowledged by the Guinness Book of World Records as the most recorded artist in music history. The Government of India honoured her with the Dadasaheb Phalke Award in 2000, in 2013, she made her debut as an actress in the film Mai, and received critical acclaim for her performance. Asha Bhosle was born in the hamlet of Goar in Sangli. Into the musical family of Master Deenanath Mangeshkar, who belongs to Marathi-speaking Gomantak Maratha Samaj and her father was an actor and classical singer on Marathi Musical stage. When she was nine years old, her father died, the family moved from Pune to Kolhapur and then to Mumbai. She and her elder sister Lata Mangeshkar began singing and acting in films to support their family and she sang her first film song Chala Chala Nav Bala for the Marathi film Majha Bal. The music for the film was composed by Datta Davjekar and she made her Hindi film debut when she sang the song Saawan Aaya for Hansraj Behls Chunariya. Her first solo Hindi film song was for the movie Raat Ki Raani, at the age of 16, she eloped with 31-year-old Ganpatrao Bhosle, marrying him against her familys wishes. In the early 1960s, prominent playback singers like Geeta Dutt, Shamshad Begum, and Lata Mangeshkar dominated the singing for the female lead, Asha used to get the assignments they refused, singing for the bad girls and vamps, or songs in the second-grade movies. In the 1950s, she sang more songs than most playback singers in Bollywood, Most of these were in low budget B or C-grade films. Her earliest songs were composed by A R Qureshi, Sajjad Hussain, and Ghulam Mohammed, singing in Sangdil, composed by Sajjad Hussain, she got reasonable recognition. Consequently, film director Bimal Roy gave her a chance to sing in Parineeta, Raj Kapoor signed her to sing Nanhe Munne Bachche with Mohammed Rafi in Boot Polish, which gained popularity. O. P. Nayyar gave Asha a break in C. I. D and she first achieved success in B. R. Chopras Naya Daur, composed by him
5.
Anup Jalota
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Anoop Jalota, also known as Anup Jalota, is an Indian singer and musician, best known for his performances in the Hindu devotional music bhajan and the Urdu form of poetry, ghazal. He is popularly known as the Bhajan Samraat, padma Shri for 2012 has been conferred upon him in the field of Art-Indian Classical Music- Vocal by Government of India. Anup Jalota was born in Nainital, Uttarakhand a renowned exponent of bhajan and he was educated in Lucknows Bhatkhande Music Institute. His father, Purushottam Das Jalota, was also a prominent Bhajan singer, anups brother, Ajay Jalota, currently lives in California. He has one brother, Anil Jalota, and two sisters, Anjali Dhir and Anita Mehra. Jalota started his career as a chorus singer in All India Radio. He is usually backed by a player, dholak player, sarod player, sarangi player, violinist, sitar player, tabla player. Some of his popular bhajans include Aisi Lagi Lagan, Main Nahi Makhan Khayo, Rang De Chunariya, Jag Me Sundar Hai Do Naam and he was also the presenter of the program Dharam Aur Hum, telecast in Star Plus from 2002 to 2005. He met Jagadguru Shree Kripaluji Maharaj in Mumbai and agreed to release several CDs of his compositions, in 2008 he recorded the title song Golden Memorable Yaadein for the CD Noorani Chehra, produced by Shaukat Kassam to commemorate the Golden Jubilee of HH the Aga Khan. Jalotas first marriage, without his familys approval, was to a Gujarati girl, Sonali Sheth, then a music student, the couple became popular in the concert circuit as Anup and Sonali Jalota. However, Sonali divorced Anup to marry his tabalchi and also a singer and his second marriage was an arranged one to Bina Bhatia, but that soon ended in divorce, too. Anups third marriage was to Medha Gujral, niece of former Indian Prime Minister I. K. Gujral, Anup and Medha have a son named Aryaman, who studied at Princeton University. Medha Jalota died on November 25,2014 at a hospital in New York City of liver failure following a second heart and first kidney transplant. Anup Jalota has earned a number of 100 certified gold, platinum and multi-platinum discs. fm http
6.
Parveen Sultana
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Begum Parveen Sultana is an Assamese Hindustani classical singer of the Patiala Gharana. She was awarded the Padma Shri, Padma Bhushan by the Government of India, Parveen was born at Daccapatty in Nagaon city, Assam, India to Ikramul Mazid of Afghanistan and Maroofa Begum of Iran. Parveens grandparents were from Afghanistan but later immigrated to Iran, one day while watching her humming in Ikramuls lap, Maroofa noticed daughter Parveens talent and asked her husband to teach her. Parveens father was her first guru and was strict with her, permitting her to only listen to Lata Mangeshkar. She also received early training from her grandfather Mohammed Najeef Khan. She later learned music from Birendra Kumar Phukan and Hiren Sarma and then on her fathers suggestion, Parveen met her next guru and future husband Dilshad Khan one day while he visited Pandit Chinmoy Lahiris home. He later accepted her as his disciple, Parveen sang her first duet with Dilshad Khan at Jashn Festival concert in Afghanistan. Parveen enjoys both vegetarian/non-vegetarian foods and is allergic to curd, Parveen faced a large mirror while practicing for hours to ensure her posture and facial expressions wouldnt look ugly or unsuitable for stage performances. Parveen gave her first stage performance in 1962 when she was 12 and has been recording music since 1965 and she has started her professional career with Abdul Majids Assamese Film Morom Trishna. Sultana has sung for Bollywood movies such as Gadar, Kudrat, Do Boond Pani, and Pakeezah, recently, she sang the theme song of Vikram Bhatts 1920. She also sang Humein Tumse Pyaar Kitna for the film Kudrat in 1981 and she has recorded for HMV, Polydor, Music India, Bharat Records, Auvidis, Magnasound, Sonodisc, and Amigo. She was conferred the Padmashri in 1976, at the age of 25 and she is married to Ustad Dilshad Khan
7.
Anuradha Paudwal
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Anuradha Paudwal is an Indian playback singer in Bollywood. Anuradha Paudwal honored with honorary degree of D. Lit, the second singer who receives this degree after the legendary Lata Mangeshkar. She has sung 8996 songs in Hindi only and some songs of other languages including her marathi songs and she is also very popular in devotional songs. Kavita Paudwal is her daughter, she is also a popular bhajan as well as a bollywood singer, Kavita took training from her mother, Anuradha Paudwal with Suresh Wadkar. Anuradha Paudwal is also best known for crooning devotional songs and is a face in Devotional field. She has sung numerous bhajans in hindi and many other languages and she has sung more than 1,500 bhajans. She has an foundation named Suryauday, most of the bhajans by her were released under the label T-Series. She has sung in languages including Hindi, Kannada, Rajasthani, Pahari, Marathi, Sanskrit, Bengali, Gujarati, Tamil, Telugu, Oriya, Assamese, Punjabi, Bhojpuri. Anuradha was born in Karwar, Uttara Kannada, Karnataka as Alka Nadakarni in a Konkani family and was brought up in Mumbai and her singing career started in 1973 with the movie, Abhimaan, in which she sang a Shloka. In the same year she made her Marathi film debut with Yashoda. In 1974, she brought out a record of Non-film Marathi songs or bhav geeten which became very popular and she also came into focus when she challenged Lata Mangeshkars claim to having recorded the maximum number of songs in a single day. She also accused the Mangeshkar sisters for indulging in monopoly, Paudwal continued to conquer new horizons and winning accolades. She was on the verge of being the next Lata Mangeshkar, even the legendary composer O P Nayyar commented, Lata is finished, Anuradha has replaced her. During this period, everything seemed to be working for the singer who left her contemporaries far behind, Kavita Krishnamurthy has always stated that, Among my counterparts Anuradha is the best singer. At her peak Anuradha Paudwal announced that she would sing for T-Series only. This stand benefited Alka Yagnik who just zoomed to the top with her association with Nadeem-Shravan and Anu Malik. As she stopped singing songs for films and concentrated more on devotional and cover-version albums, for almost five years, Anuradha Paudwal did not sing for many films and for any other music company. In 1976, she got her break as a singer in Hindi films with Kalicharan
8.
Alka Yagnik
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Alka Yagnik is an Indian playback singer. She is noted in Hindi cinema for a career spanning three decades. Further, as many as twenty of her tracks feature in BBCs Top 40 Bollywood Soundtracks of all time review, Alka Yagnik was born in Kolkata on 20 March 1966 to Gujarati Hindu Parents. Her mother Shubha Yagnik was a singer of Indian classical music and she attended the Modern High School for Girls. In 1972 at age six, she started singing for Akashvani, at age 10, her mother brought her to Mumbai as a child singer. She was advised to wait until her voice matured, but her mother remained determined, on a subsequent visit, Alka got a letter of introduction to Raj Kapoor from his Kolkata distributor. Kapoor heard the girl and sent her with a letter to noted music director Laxmikant, impressed, Laxmikant gave her two alternatives — an immediate start as a dubbing artist or a later break as a singer, Shubha chose the latter for her daughter. Alka is classically trained and began singing bhajans for Akashvani, Calcutta at the age of six and her first song was for the film Payal Ki Jhankaar in, followed by Laawaris with the song Mere Angane Mein, followed by the film Hamari Bahu Alka. She got her big break with the song Ek Do Teen from the film Tezaab, the song won her first out of seven Filmfare Award for Best Female Playback Singer. In a career spanning three decades she has sung many duet songs, most of these have been with Kumar Sanu. She has also sung duets with Abhijeet, Hariharan, Vinod Rathod, Sonu Nigam. She has such as Tum Aaye and Shairana in which she worked in collaboration with award-winning lyricist Javed Akhtar. She has also rendered the Hanuman Chalisa and various devotional songs, Alka shares the title with Asha Bhosle for the greatest number of Filmfare Awards won by a single female playback singer. She had recently judged Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Lil Champs Season 5 as a Maha Guru, in addition to this, her song Chamma Chamma from China Gate was featured in the song Hindi Sad Diamonds from the soundtrack of the film Moulin Rouge. She has also performing in live concerts around the world. Also her song Choli Ke Peeche from the movie Khalnayak was voted as the hottest song of the century in a poll conducted by Sanona and she has also been involved in various projects pertaining to empowerment of the girl child. On 25 May 2014 she appearerd as a special guest along with Kumar Sanu for the popular TV show Comedy Nights with Kapil, in 2014, she once again teamed up with Sonu Nigam to sing a song Phool Khil Jayenge for child health awareness. She also sang a song titled Maine Li Jo Angdai for the album Womens Day Special and it was composed by Farid Sabri, Harish Chauhan and Gurudatt Sahil, and penned by Sudhakar Sharma
9.
IMDb
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In 1998 it became a subsidiary of Amazon Inc, who were then able to use it as an advertising resource for selling DVDs and videotapes. As of January 2017, IMDb has approximately 4.1 million titles and 7.7 million personalities in its database, the site enables registered users to submit new material and edits to existing entries. Although all data is checked before going live, the system has open to abuse. The site also featured message boards which stimulate regular debates and dialogue among authenticated users, IMDb shutdown the message boards permanently on February 20,2017. Anyone with a connection can read the movie and talent pages of IMDb. A registration process is however, to contribute info to the site. A registered user chooses a name for themselves, and is given a profile page. These badges range from total contributions made, to independent categories such as photos, trivia, bios, if a registered user or visitor happens to be in the entertainment industry, and has an IMDb page, that user/visitor can add photos to that page by enrolling in IMDbPRO. Actors, crew, and industry executives can post their own resume and this fee enrolls them in a membership called IMDbPro. PRO can be accessed by anyone willing to pay the fee, which is $19.99 USD per month, or if paid annually, $149.99, which comes to approximately $12.50 per month USD. Membership enables a user to access the rank order of each industry personality, as well as agent contact information for any actor, producer, director etc. that has an IMDb page. Enrolling in PRO for industry personnel, enables those members the ability to upload a head shot to open their page, as well as the ability to upload hundreds of photos to accompany their page. Anyone can register as a user, and contribute to the site as well as enjoy its content, however those users enrolled in PRO have greater access and privileges. IMDb originated with a Usenet posting by British film fan and computer programmer Col Needham entitled Those Eyes, others with similar interests soon responded with additions or different lists of their own. Needham subsequently started an Actors List, while Dave Knight began a Directors List, and Andy Krieg took over THE LIST from Hank Driskill, which would later be renamed the Actress List. Both lists had been restricted to people who were alive and working, the goal of the participants now was to make the lists as inclusive as possible. By late 1990, the lists included almost 10,000 movies and television series correlated with actors and actresses appearing therein. On October 17,1990, Needham developed and posted a collection of Unix shell scripts which could be used to search the four lists, at the time, it was known as the rec. arts. movies movie database