Asha Parekh

Asha Parekh is a Gujarati born on 2 October 1942. Her mother, Sudha aka Salma Parekh, was a Bohra Muslim and her father, Bachubhai Parekh, was Hindu Gujarati. Her mother enrolled her in Indian classical dance classes at an early age and she learned from many teachers, including Pandit Bansilal Bharati.

Asha stopped acting in 1995 to pursue directing and producing television serials. Parekh received the Filmfare Lifetime Achievement Award in 2002. She has continued to receive other Lifetime Achievement Awards: the Kalakar Award in 2004; the International Indian Film Academy Awards in 2006; the Pune International Film Festival Award in 2007; and the Ninth Annual Bollywood Award in Long Island, New York in 2007. She received the Living Legend Award from the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI).

Parekh has remained unmarried, claiming that her reputation of being unapproachable made people hesitate in asking for her hand in marriage. In her memoir "The Hit Girl", she confirmed rumours that she was romantically involved with director Nasir Hussain who was already married, but out of respect for both their families, she couldn't marry him. Previously, Parekh would only state that she had a longtime boyfriend but declined to elaborate on the relationship, only stating that "it was nice while it lasted." She said she had not seen Nasir Hussain during the last year of his life, as he became reclusive because of his wife's death, but she did speak to him the day before he died in 2002. She almost married an Indian professor living in America, but he didn't want to give up his girlfriend, so she called off their wedding plans. She had also tried to adopt a child, but he had birth defects, and the doctors refused to let her adopt him.

In 2008, she was a judge on the reality show Tyohaar Dhamaaka on the Indian entertainment channel 9X. In 2017, her autobiography (co-written by Khalid Mohammed) titled "The Hit Girl" was released.