She appeared in only 10 films and died at the age of 34, but Vimi’s career had more tragedy than a Bollywood potboiler. Born in 1943, Vimi trained to be a singer, but her decision to become an actor was met with staunch protest by her family. She was disowned, and left to navigate the film industry by herself. But she was a woman of taste; she lived in a Pali Hill bungalow, played golf in her spare time, and drove a fast car. In 1968, after the success of her debut film Humraaz, it seemed like Vimi was going to become one of the biggest stars of her generation. But her life took a nosedive not long afterwards, sending her to Kolkata, forcing her to rely on alcohol, and resulting in her untimely death at the age of 34.
In an episode of Tabassum Talkies, the venerable host said that Vimi was married to a Kolkata-based businessman named Shiv Agarwal, who was disinherited by his family because of Vimi. In fact, she was already married when she joined the films. In a 1968 interview with Star and Style, Vimi had said that her husband was going to produce a film for her to star in, and that she had signed three movies — Rangeela, Sandesh and Appointment — after the success of Humraaz. Little did she know that Shiv would eventually leave her.
Actress Vimi and producer director BR Chopra. Express archive photo on 13.05.1966
Even though her first director, BR Chopra, said in a 1967 interview with Picture Post that she was “intelligent, educated and grasps things quickly,” he didn’t cast her in any future films. None of her movies after Humraaz worked. She got by on magazine photoshoots and public appearances. By 1971, she had disappeared into oblivion. It was only when she died in 1977 that the truth about her downfall came to light. It was revealed that her marriage with Shiv broke down because his parents convinced him to leave her when her career started to spiral, and that she had started living with a film distributor named Jolly, in the hope that it would help her professionally.
She started a textiles business, which was sold off in order to pay her debts. Tabassum said that Vimi developed a reputation for being a poor actor, which resulted in her not getting work. “Because of this, she took to alcohol,” Tabassum said. She added that the distributor that Vimi had holed up with forced her into sex work, making it seem like this was the only way that she could revive her career. “Vimi became a broken woman; she started drinking more heavily, and that, too, the cheap liquor,” Tabassum said. Vimi died in 1977 of liver disease at the Nanavati Hospital, and was taken by Jolly to the crematorium on a ‘thela’. Nobody from the film industry showed up for her funeral, although, it was said that Sunil Dutt was there.
Leading lady Vimi faces the camera at the muhurat of film Vachan. Express archive photo
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Even in death, Vimi wasn’t spared the humiliation. A person named Krishna, claiming to be a ‘friend’, wrote a hurtful obituary in the Anand Bazar Patrika. Krishna described Vimi’s death as “a great pain-reliever to her.” He called her the girl “with the roving eye who went out without her husband in the fond hope that some producer or actor will make her an offer.” In her short career, Vimi appeared in films such as Aabroo, with Ashok Kumar, and Nanak Nam Jahaz Hai, starring Prithviraj Kapoor and IS Johar. She also appeared in a cameo in Jaya Bhaduri’s Guddi. Her final film was Subhash Ghai’s Krodhi, starring Dharmendra and Shashi Kapoor. It was released several years after her death.
