veteran actor Sanjay Mishra He once temporarily stopped acting to work at a dhaba in Rishikesh after being heartbroken by the death of his father. In a recent interaction, Sanjay spoke about how, during his father’s last days, he felt that his father was humiliated by him, a feeling his father also expressed in his diary.
Talking to Prakhar Gupta, he said, “I went through an operation during the shooting of All The Best. And after that I rushed to Rishikesh. There was an old man who used to make tea and Maggi in Dhaba and I was free at that time, my mind was not working because my health was not good, and also my father had just died.”
Sanjay also shared that he was “supposed to die” as doctors had told him that he would survive only 1 to 1.5 days if the surgery was unsuccessful. He admitted that the people who visited him in the hospital only made things worse as they told stories of other people who had died from similar health problems. “I told my father that I would die on medicine if I kept meeting these people. Then he stopped people from visiting me,” she said.
While Sanjay himself was battling serious health problems, his father passed away just days after his discharge from the hospital. “They discharged me and after 8 or 10 days my father died,” he said. Sanjay remembered that he had sent him a chicken dish made by his fan, who was a cook. He said his father consumed the dish three days after preparing it, causing his health to deteriorate. “I told my father. How can you have a three-day-old chicken?” and he told me ‘Tumhari nasihat ki zaroorat nahin Hai (I don’t need your advice). “These were the last words my father spoke to me,” he said.
Sanjay further recalled that his father felt humiliated after shouting at fans in front of him. “After I was discharged from the hospital, my father took me to watch my film Aloo Chaat. He wanted me to recover and start doing action in the cinema. But in the theatre, people started hoarding me to take photos, and I shouted at them. I insulted them and my house, even saying that the word ‘kambakht’ is a big deal. And my father had also taken his colleagues with us. My father told me that I should not act like that, and I shouted at him in response: ‘What do you know? You’re saying whatever.’ At the time he was taking strong antibiotics and had not eaten. Later, after his death, when I looked at his diary, he had written that I humiliated him. At that moment, I wanted him to open his eyes once so I could say that this was not what I intended.”
After discovering his father’s feelings during his last days, Sanjay said he was devastated and sought solace in spiritual villages. “After this, I went to Haridwar, Rishikesh, because I thought that if we all have to die, then why are we trying so hard? I often get lost, I don’t pick up the phone. I took a place in Lonavala and go there, and I try not to have any thoughts in my mind.”
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In an earlier interview with SCREEN, Sanjay had said, “I was suffering from a serious illness. The doctors had removed 15 liters of pus from my stomach and just after it was cured, I lost my father. He had started losing his life. So I went to Rishikesh and started making omelettes in a dhaba near the bank of the Ganges. The dhaba owner told me that I would have to wash 50 cups a day and I would get 150 rupees. But then I thought I needed money. to survive.”