Parveen Babi's name is often remembered with a mix of admiration and sadness. The late actress was one of the talented stars of her time, yet her life away from the spotlight was marked by isolation and mental health struggles.
Years after her death, actor Pooja Bedi shared a personal memory that offered a glimpse into what Parveen Babi was going through in her later years.
In her conversation with Siddharth Kannan, Pooja – whose father, Kabir Bedi, was once in a relationship with Parveen Babi – spoke about how the late actress believed that the FBI was plotting against her.
Talking about her later interactions with Parveen Babi, Pooja Bedi said, “I remember that many years later she had come back to India. Everyone was saying that something was wrong with her. I went to her home; she opened her door, and she looked so different. She had put on a lot of weight, and she had wild hair.”
Pooja said that Parveen Babi was happy to see her that day. “She was so excited to see me and said, ‘Pooja! Hi! Come in.' Then she gave me a big hug, and we were sitting and chatting, and everything was completely normal,” she recalled.
But soon, things took an unexpected turn. “Suddenly, she said, ‘I am sorry that I can't offer you food because I only eat eggs.' I asked her why she ate only eggs, and she replied, ‘This is the one thing they can't tamper with.' I asked her, ‘Who?' She said, ‘The Secret Service, or the FBI,'” Pooja Bedi added.
The actress said she noticed that Parveen Babi was acting differently and seemed deeply anxious. She believed that people were out to harm her. “She told me that she doesn't buy makeup from the markets because someone contaminates it. I asked her, ‘How would someone know what you are going to buy and when you are going to buy it?' She said, ‘They know everything.' I immediately thought that there was something extremely wrong that was going on around there. I got really concerned and confused at that point in time,” Pooja said.
Last year, in an interview, Kabir Bedi shared that he never left Parveen Babi. Instead, she distanced herself out of fear that he might persuade her to seek treatment for her mental health condition. Click here to read all about it.
Parveen Babi's personal life has been well-documented. The actress remained unmarried after her relationships with Danny Denzongpa, Kabir Bedi and Mahesh Bhatt.
Parveen Babi was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia in her later years. On January 20, 2005, she died due to multiple organ failure. Her body was discovered two days later, on January 22, after her building's secretary informed the police that she had not picked up her groceries or newspapers for three days.
