Kalpana Kartik - Career

Career

Mona Singh (19 September 1931), aka Kalpana Kartik born in a Punjabi Christian family was a student of the prestigious St Bedes college in Shimla. In her graduation year, she participated in the Ms. Shimla contest, and as luck would have it she bagged the trophy and also the attention of a struggling film-maker from Bombay . The director was an erudite man and he managed to convince her otherwise elitist family to allow her to accept his offer of joining his fledgling film company as a leading lady. Thus, Mona Singh was re-christened Kalpana Kartik and she moved to Bombay (now known as Mumbai). Film history tells us that Kalpana Kartik was the wrong person in the right place at the right time. It was Chetan Anand who brought her to Bombay to join his film company Navketan Films that he ran along with his younger brother Dev Anand. Her first film Baazi was a huge success and went on to become a landmark in Indian cinema. Baazi was a gamble that defined the destinies of many luminaries all of whom got a career boost from the film. All this was about the 'right place' and 'right time' part of it.

Kalpana Kartik, became a part of Navketan when it was beginning to spread its wings. She was associated with the film company during its most momentous years. She started with Baazi, the debut of Guru Dutt and ended with Nau Do Gyarah, the debut film of Vijay Anand. Between these two films came Taxi Driver, which was the 'coming of age' film of the Navketan banner. It was Navketan's first super-success and also the film on whose sets Dev Anand secretly married Kalpana Kartik during a lunch break. Kalpana's time in Navketan saw four different directors take reign - Guru Dutt, Chetan Anand, Mandi Burman and Vijay Anand.

Kalpana Kartik worked as an Associate Producer for Tere Ghar Ke Samne (1963), Jewel Thief (1967), Prem Pujari (1970), Shareef Budmaash (1973), Heera Panna (1973), and Jaaneman (1976). Dev Anand played the lead role in these movies.