By Shishir Prashant 
PrashantNews
Veteran actress Kamini Kaushal on Friday died at her Mumbai home at the age of 98.
She created a record in her final on-screen cameo appearance in the 2022 film Laal Singh Chaddha at the age of 95. She was also widely known for playing mother to Manoj Kumar and Rajesh Khanna in many movies.
Born Uma Kashyap on February 24, 1927 in Lahore, Kamini Kaushal was the Bollywood industry’s oldest actress who had worked in early 1940s and 1950s as heroine opposite legendary actors like Dilip Kumar. She worked in the Bollywood cinemas for record more than seven decades.
Dilip Kumar, in his biography, has admitted his attraction to Kaushal. But Kamini rejected his proposal as she was already married to her elder sister’s widower and was taking care of her elder sister’s kids. The two worked in the 1948 films Nadiya Ke Paar and Shaheed, and developed a fondness for each other.
Dilip said that she was his first love. Kamini quoted in an interview on this: “We were both shattered. We were very happy with each other. We shared a great rapport. But what to do? That’s life. I can’t dump people and say ‘Enough now, I’m going!’ I had taken on the girls. I wouldn’t be able to show my face to my sister. My husband, a fine human being, understood why it happened. Everyone falls in love,” she said in the interview.
She appeared in The Jewel in the Crown (1984), a popular British television serial, as Aunt Shalini.
In 2020, she received Screen Award for Best Supporting Actress for the blockbuster movie Kabir Singh.
She made a popular puppet show broadcast on the national channel at the time, “Doordarshan”, which ran for a year (1989 to 1991), and was the first such children’s series in Hindi.