Failed radio auditions preceded Bollywood's angry young man
Amitabh Bachchan almost kept the revolutionary name Inquilaab, failed an All India Radio newsreader audition, and was still counted a failed newcomer at thirty. Then Salim–Javed insisted he play the lead in Zanjeer in 1973—and François Truffaut later called him a one-man industry.
Born October 11, 1942, in Allahabad (now Prayagraj) to poet Harivansh Rai Bachchan and activist Teji Bachchan, he nearly received the name Inquilaab until Sumitranandan Pant suggested Amitabh. His father rejected caste surnames, publishing under Bachchan—child-like in colloquial Hindi—and the family adopted that name for school and screen. Educated at Sherwood College and Kirori Mal College, earning a Bachelor of Science in 1962, he applied to All India Radio in Delhi and failed the audition, then worked as a business executive in Kolkata before theatre and film.
He debuted as narrator of Mrinal Sen's Bhuvan Shome in 1969 and acted in Saat Hindustani. Anand in 1971 brought a Filmfare Supporting Actor win beside Rajesh Khanna, yet by age thirty he had only two real hits and a stack of flops. Screenwriters Salim Khan and Javed Akhtar saw genius others missed. Their Zanjeer script needed an angry young man rejected by romantic-hero stars; they pushed Prakash Mehra to cast Bachchan. The 1973 crime film broke his dry spell, earned a Best Actor Filmfare nomination, and redefined Bollywood masculinity against Emergency-era frustration.
From Deewaar and Sholay through Don and Coolie he dominated the 1970s and 1980s so thoroughly that Truffaut dubbed him a one-man industry. Audiences nicknamed him Big B, Shahenshah, and Star of the Millennium; a 1999 BBC poll named him greatest star of stage or screen. After a 1990s break, Mohabbatein in 2000 sparked a second act spanning Black, Piku, and Kalki 2898 AD. India awarded him Padma Shri in 1984, Padma Bhushan in 2001, Padma Vibhushan in 2015, and the Dadasaheb Phalke Award in 2018; France made him an Officer of the Legion of Honour in 2007.
Source: Amitabh Bachchan
