Obituaries of the months of July 2012

MOHAMMED BIN SAUD (78): A senior prince and former defence minister of Saudi Arabia who was not in line for the throne, but wielded influence as part of a council of royal family members that helps select the heirs to rule the oil-rich Western ally, died on July 8.

ERNEST BORGNINE (95): Renowned Hollywood actor who seemed destined for tough-guy characters but won an Academy Award for Marty in 1955 and Golden Globe, BAFTA etc for the same and acted in several hits including McHaLe’s Navy, The Dirty Dozen, The wild Bunch, Spike of Bensonhurst,  died on July 8 in Los Angeles.

DONALD J. SOBOL (87): The creator of Encyclopaedia Brown, the clever boy detective who made bookworms of many a reluctant young reader and whose work have been translated into 12 languages and have sold millions of copies worldwide, died on July 11 in South Miami.

STEPHEN R. COVEY (79): The well-known US motivational speaker and author of the best-selling the seven Habits of Highly Effective People, Which sold more than 20 million copies in 33 languages, died on July 16.

JON LORD (71): Former bandmember of British hard-rock band “Deep purple” and the co-writer of legendary songs like Smoke On The Water, Who is best known for his Orchestral work Concerto for Group & Orchestra is dead.

KITTY WELLS (92): The “Queen of Country Music” who broke down barriers in the 1950s to women in the genre with a number-one hit It Wasn’t God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels, died on July 16 in Tennessee, USA.

CELESTE HOLM (95): Oscar-Winning US  actress, who was the original  girl who couldn’t say no in the musical  Oklahoma! And won the best supporting actress Academy Award in 1948 for Gentlemen’s Agreement and later appeared in High Society (1956) and Also garnered Oscar nominations in 1950 for Come to the Stable and in 1951 for All About Eve, died on July 15 in New York.

SERGIO PININFARINA (85): Legendary Italian car designer and a life Senator whose company designed Ferraris for decades and is also famous for designing the 2006 Winter Olympics Torch, the Coca-Cola Free-Style beverage dispenser, the Lavazza coffee machine and the Juventus stadium, died on July 3.

JOHN ATTA MILLS (68): Ghana’s president who according to unconfirmed report had been suffering from throat cancer died on July 24 in Accra.

RAJESH KHANNA (69): Bollywood’s original superstar nicknamed Kaka (see photo on cover), who charmed his way into the hearts of millions of swooning women, died in Mumbai on July 18 after a prolonged illness. Billed as Bollywood’s first superstar for delivering 15 hits in a row from 1969 to 1971 (an unbroken record), Rajesh Khanna epitomised a range of emotions on the big screen- from melancholy to romance-with a rich bouquet of lilting songs like ‘Zindagi ek safar hai suhana’ and ‘Mere sapno ki Rani’ making his movies and characters immortal. His blockbusters include Aradhana, Anand, Hathi mere Saathi, Avtaar, Roti, Saccha Jhutha etc. He, who made his debut in 1966 with Aakhri Khat acted in 163 films,  of which 106 had him as solo lead hero,22 were two-hero projects and 17 short films and won three Filmfare best actor awards and was nominated for the award 14 times. In 2005, Awarded Filmfare Lifetime Achievement Award. He turned producer in 1985 with Alag Alag. He remained Lok Sabha member from New Delhi constituency between 1992 and 1996.

DARA SINGH (83): Bollywood’s veteran actor-wrestler known as Rustam-e-Hind, who played Hanuman in epic teleserial Ramayan, and also remembered for one of the most exciting bouts in the history of wrestling competitions when he lifted an almost 200 kg King of Australia over his head and twirled him around, died on July 12 in Mumbai.

HIREN BHATTACHARYYA (80): Popular and celebrated Assamese poet and winner of the Sahitya Akademi Award (1992) and several honours, known as Hiru-da, who had to his name 10 anthologies of poems apart from two collection of rhymes for children (‘Lora Dhemali’ and ‘Akou Dhemali’) died on July 4 Guwahati.

LAKSHMI SEHGAL (97): A veteran of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bosh’s Indian National Army (INA) who was the first captain of the INA’s women’s wing later represented in the Rajya Sabha and in 2002, unsuccessfully stood for president as the joint left candidate against APJ Abdul Kalam, died on July 23 in Kanpur.

BABU RAM ALIAS B.R ISHARA (77): Born as Roshan Lal Sharma, the Bollywood veteran writer-director with a distinct beard who was an iconoclast, a redical who made brave and unusual films and changed the rules of the game and brought sex on the menu in Hindi cinema, questioned middle-class hypocrisy and annoyed both moralists and the Censor Board in the 1970s with his bold movies like Chetna (1970) with Anil Dhawan, Charitra (1971) with parveen Babi, Zaroorat (1973) with Reena Roy, Kagaaz Ki Nao (1975) with Raj Kiran died on July 24 in New Delhi.