Mumbai: Helena Luke, the first wife of actor-politician Mithun Chakraborty, passed away in the US on November 3. She was 68. The cause of her death is currently not known. She wrote in her final Facebook post, “Feeling weird. Mixed emotions and no idea why, discombobulated (sic)”. The news of her death was confirmed by dancer and actor Kapana Iyer on social media.
Helena, who met Mithun in the late 1970s, got married to him in 1979. However, their relationship lasted only four months and they later got a divorce. Helena made a mark in Bollywood as an actor, with her role in the Amitabh Bachchan-starrer ‘Mard’, in which she essayed the role of a British queen.
Helena later moved to the United States, where she settled and worked in the airline industry. Despite her brief film career and short-lived marriage, she remains remembered for her contributions to Hindi cinema. The actor had once revealed that Mithun had been unfaithful to her during the marriage. “He was immature. He doubted I was having an affair. It was only later that I realised he had a guilt complex. He himself was fooling around my back and thought I was doing the same,” she said.
Meanwhile, Mithun Chakraborty has been feted as the 54th winner of the Dadasaheb Phalke Award, which was instituted in 1969 in honour of Dadasaheb Phalke, who is considered as the father of Indian cinema. Other recipients of the award include Prithviraj Kapoor, Vinod Khanna, Raj Kapoor, Shashi Kapoor, Lata Mangeshkar, Asha Bhosle, BR Chopra and Yash Chopra. Actor Waheeda Rehman received the Dadasaheb Phalke Award in 2021.
Earlier, this year, Mithun was admitted to a private hospital in Kolkata after he complained of chest pain. Sources close to the actor said that he was feeling uneasy, following which he was taken to Apollo hospital where he was diagnosed with Ischemic Cerebrovascular Accident. He was last seen in the Bengali film 'Kabuliwala'. It was released in theatres in December 2023. The film was directed by Suman Ghosh. The actor is also a recipient of the prestigious Padma Bhushan Award.
