Bollywood stars who went naked

                                                                      

Simi

1. Simi Garewal

in ‘Mera Naam Joker’ and ‘Siddhartha’ (1972) – Newly returned from England, Simi Garewal bagged some of the most prestigious films from her generation, though she never found the commercial success of her peers. In both ‘Mera Naam Joker’ by Raj Kapoor and ‘Siddhartha’, a film adapted from Hermann Hesse’s novel of the same name (both 1972), she sheds her quintessential whites and pretty much everything else too.

Protima Bedi

2.Protima Bedi

in the Cine Blitz promotional campaign (1974) – Celebrated danseuse and Kabir Bedi’s bohemian wife stripped down to nothing and ran naked on Juhu beach as part of a promotional campaign to launch filmi rag Cine Blitz in 1974. She made headlines, naturally.

Dimple Kapadia

3. Dimple Kapadia

in ‘Saagar’ (1985) – Her introduction to Rishi Kapoor in the film went like this: a young village belle goes for a dip in the ocean. Then when returning she wraps herself in a sarong, notices that Rishi Kapoor has been watching her through plastic weeds hanging above him. She trips and her sarong gets undone for a split second. Yet, to many, this qualified as at least a half-monty moment in Bollywood.

Mandakini

4.Mandakini

in ‘Ram Teri Ganga Maili’ (1985) – A cliché but it does remain one of the most bare-breasted moments in Hindi cinema. Mandakini became a household name with this blockbuster, but also vanished just as quickly following allegations of her being Dawood Ibrahim’s moll.

Deepa Sahi

5.Deepa Sahi

in ‘Maya Memsaab’ (1993) – In this film, director Ketan Mehta’s wife played a day-glo Madame Bovary, a novel by Gustave Flaubert in which the wife of a doctor gives in to illicit affairs and hedonism to escape the banality of provincial life. And escape she does in what is perhaps Shah Rukh Khan’s most carnal performance on screen as well. Deepa Sahi exposed her breasts and features in numerous romps with King Khan in this awkward adaptation. 

Mamta Kulkarni

6.Mamta Kulkarni

on the Stardust cover (1993) – She vanished just as quickly as she arrived too. However, in the early 1990s, Mamta Kulkarni was in the eye of a storm for appearing topless on the cover of Stardust magazine. Lawsuits were slapped and last-minute bails were sought in India’s most regressive decade, but this was a first for a Bollywood actress after Protima Bedi’s legendary Full Monty on Juhu beach in 1974 (see earlier note).

Anu Agarwal

7. Anu Agarwal

in ‘The Cloud Door’ by Mani Kaul (1994) – This short Indo-German film by acclaimed director Mani Kaul was inspired by erotic themes in Hindi and Muslim literature. True to its genre, it featured the ‘Aashiqui’ girl naked in bed with Murad Ali in a rather steamy sequence.

Milind Soman

8. Milind Soman

and Madhu Sapre in the Tuff shoes campaign (1995) – Okay, granted Madhu Sapre never bothered with Bollywood, but Milind Soman did. So this duo qualifies as a tinsel town couple that did ruffle many a right-wing feather when appearing in the buff for a sports shoe campaign in the mid-‘90s.

Hemant Birje

9.Hemant Birje

in ‘Divine Lovers’ (1997) - Director B Subhash made him a national sensation with ‘Tarzan’, a 1985 blockbuster film that Hemant Birje and his co-star Kimi Katkar are most remembered by. By the time Birje was forgotten, he was summoned to act in B Subhash’s English-language film ‘Divine Lovers’, starring ‘Grease 2’ hero Maxwell Caulfield and Marc Zuber. Packaged as an erotic film set in exotic India, the film was initially to star Anu Agarwal, who developed cold feet based on the sheer amount of nudity required. Eventually they roped in some LA actress. The skin-flick bombed and B Subhash lost a lot of money. But Hemant Birje did appear in a flash nude moment in this one. 

Nandana Sen

10.Nandana Sen

in ‘Rang Rasiya’ (2008) – Daughter of Nobel laureate Amartya Sen, Nandana Sen stars in Ketan Mehta’s ‘Rang Rasiya’. The film is based on India’s most celebrated artist, Raja Ravi Varma played by the brooding Randeep Hooda. Sen plays Randeep Hooda’s muse and since Raja Ravi Varma painted nudes, Nandana too gave us some mirch masala.