Straight Answers

<div class="section1"><div class="Normal">mahesh bhatt, director, on women’s day and the women in his life <span style="" font-weight:="" bold="">who has been the most influential woman in your life?</span> my mother, undoubtedly. a single parent — a shia-muslim in love with a brahmin filmmaker, she lived life on her own terms. an uneducated woman, she led a life that most educated women of today fantasise about.i have gathered my entire emotional wealth from her. audacity is what i have gained from her. she even taught the same to my daughter pooja. she told her that if you ever want a child, do not make it imperative to get married. <span style="" font-weight:="" bold="">you have been married twice. what role did the two women play in your life?</span> i fell in love with lorraine bright, who’s half armenian and half scottish, when i was 16 and she just 13! living in a mumbai orphanage, she seemed like a woman in distress to me. i married her when i was 20 and became a father at 21! though the relationship did not last, it held on for 18 years. even today, i’m not divorced and we continue to be companions — not man and wife. since things were not working out, i had an affair with parveen babi. later, i met soni and married her when i was 38. we have two daughters, shaheen and allia. <span style="" font-weight:="" bold="">who are the other women in your life?</span> well, i’ve been outnumbered by the women at home. there are my maids — zulekha, an elderly muslim woman; chanda, a maharashtrian; and sharda, an english-speaking young girl who’s more like a daughter to me. all these women have earthy intelligence and raw wisdom, and i always consider their opinion to be important. <span style="" font-weight:="" bold="">how have you portrayed these women in your films?</span> my films are a very pale reflection of these strong women. they are best portrayed in arth and zakhm. aashiqui has scenes from my first love life. <span style="" font-weight:="" bold="">do you think women’s day gives women more opportunities and space? </span>basically, a woman has a space of her own, an in-scape that you cannot tread upon. this is where she lives — alone. the real women of india do not need a day to voice their problems. they are a major driving force in the lives of their men, who must give them more power and better status. </div> </div>