I have been privileged to write about Amitabh Bachchan for the last fifty years and more . I have written about him when he was a nobody in Bombay (it was not Mumbai yet) and was discovered by my guru Khwaja Ahmad Abbas in "Saat Hindustani" and had signed his first contract with Abbas for five thousand rupees with a place to sleep in a dormitory in Goa and was to have his breakfast , lunch and dinner with the rest of the forty member unit which included Abbas.
I saw "Saat Hindustani" flop, but I saw this unusual tall actor succeed as an actor and even win a National Award for his performance. I saw him give amazing performances in films like " Bansi Birju", "Ek Nazar" and "Bombay To Goa ", but I sat up in my chair and applauded him after that daring scene in "Zanjeer" in which he defies Pran, the bad man of the area and then there was no looking back for the son of Dr Harivanshrai Bachchan and Teji Bachchan who went on to be the angry young man and the star of the millennium he is today when he will be seventy nine years old on October 11.
I have been a close witness (thanks to him) to his rise and rise and the few falls in his illustrious career. I was there when that one nearly fatal accident on the sets of Manmohan Desai's "Coolie" almost killed him and his sheer will power and the will of the doctors, Dr Farokh Udwadia , Dr S Shah and Dr Jayant Barve fought their best battle to bring him back to life and succeded on that fateful night of August 2, 1982 and how he was taken home in a victory truck with hoardings of welcoming him back to life greeting him all along the way.
I was witness to his lonely battle to fight back and emerge a victor in the face of the most grim odds and cruel circumstances.
And then I was there when he fought back as an actor and what a way he fought his way to the very top again and created a new Amitabh Bachchan on the strength of his talent alone. He knew he could win only if he transformed himself from the angry young man to the understanding old man and he surprised three generations of his admirers with one brilliant performance after another.
It will be fifty years and more since an unknown actor with an unusual name came to Indian Cinema and created a niche for himself, which no other star, superstar or other legend has been able to take away from him, however hard they have or they may try. There has been only one Amitabh Bachchan whose name is etched on the sky of success and I don't think there will be another like him in the time and times to come, take or leave it, but that is my opinion about him which has lived with me for generations and I am sure will not leave me for generations to come.
I am extremely grateful for having the opportunity to live through the era of Amitabh Bachchan and this I swear is no intention to flatter a dear friend who has now growing beyond all praise and gratitude..
What more can I say about a friend who has always been a friend and I hope will be a friend as long as time and friendship lasts.