Hema Malini, who grew up in cities like Chennai and Delhi, has always favoured bungalows surrounded by greenery. When she moved into apartments in Mumbai, she felt stifled—not just for one night, but for months. She bought her first bungalow in Mumbai in 1972 while shooting for Seeta Aur Geeta.
Hema Malini's Father Bought Her an Apartment in Mumbai
In Ram Kamal Mukherjee's book Hema Malini: Beyond the Dream Girl, the actress looked back at her early days and recalled preferring bungalows over flats.
She once got a call from her father while on set, asking her to visit Walkeshwar, a neighborhood in South Mumbai. During her break, Hema discovered he had bought her a sprawling sea-facing apartment. "He asked if I liked the flat. That was perhaps the first time I told him I didn't fancy staying in town (South Bombay) but wanted a house with lots of trees, just like the one we had in Chennai. It was then that he started looking for a bungalow in Juhu," she shared.
Hema also recalled living in a small Bandra apartment during the shooting of her Hindi debut Sapno Ka Saudagar with Raj Kapoor. The space was primarily used by costume designer Bhanu Athaiya for dress trials. Soon after, she moved into a bungalow—but it was haunted.
"Every night, I felt someone was trying to choke me; I had difficulty breathing. I slept with my mother, and she noticed how restless I was. If it had happened only once or twice, we would have ignored it, but it occurred every night," Hema recalled her early apartment days.
"I remember Dharmendra-ji would drop by for coffee, but back then I had no idea I would fall in love and marry him," she added. By then, they had acted together in films, and she bought her first Juhu bungalow—a five-year-old property owned by a Gujarati family. "We added extra rooms later. I loved it because of all the trees around," she said.
Hema Malini and Dharmendra's first wife, Prakash Kaur, lived across the street, but they rarely crossed paths. In the same book, Esha Deol shared that she first met Prakash Kaur at the age of 30: "I touched her feet, and she blessed me before leaving."
Dharmendra spent most of his life with Prakash Kaur and their sons, while Hema lived with her daughters in a bungalow after marriage. Dharmendra would visit them often at the house.
Film veteran Dharmendra died at 89 at his Mumbai residence on November 24, last year.