Biography

Om Puri was born in Ambala (then in Punjab, now in Haryana) without a doubt, but there is a dispute regarding the date and year of his birth. There is neither any birth certificate nor any other record about it and the year could be 1949 or 1950. And his mother, Tara Devi always told him that he was born two days after Dussehra.

Later, when he joined school in Sanaur (near Patiala), his Mamaji or maternal uncle picked 9 March 1950 as his birth date and year. That stuck as the official date. Years later, around 1976, when he came to Bombay, Om decided to give himself a new birth date. He looked up the two days after Dussehra that year and decided to keep 18 0ctober as his birthday and since then, that is the day he celebrated with friends and family. So at times he received birthday cards twice a year.

It took him so long to decide on a birthday because he never had the occasion to remember or celebrate it throughout his school and college years, apart from the fact that his mother made kheer two days after Dussehra each year while she lived. No fancy parties or dinners. Just a bowl of simple kheer made at home to celebrate the birth of one of India’s finest actors. As many Years later, his friend and colleague, actor Naseeruddin Shah was to remark,” Om was born with a wooden spoon in his mouth”.

Since Om did not go to school and had no fancy toys, he amused himself by playing basic games on the street like gulli-danda and marbles. Om’s earliest memory is of playing with marbles by the gutter and every time a marble rolled into it, he would dip his hands to pick it up. And each time he dipped his hands, his mother would forcibly bathe him, irrespective of whether it was winter or summer.

Once some relatives had come home and given him five rupees to buy toys. Om was ecstatic and bought a red car which ran when turned with a key-a chaabiwali gadi-for a rupee and a half. Unfortunately, he had to return it as his mother thought the rupee and a half would go a long way to put food on the table, not a toy car!

Another childhood memory etched clearly in his mind was the time his hands were tied to the bed when the family was briefly living in Riwadi. He had got smallpox and was always irritable and itching to scratch. In spite of his hands being tied, the pimples left permanent scars on his face, which in a way have become his trademark and add to his persona.

While the family was in Bhatinda, Om was seven, he recalls the time his father, who was in charge of the railway store, was arrested on charges of theft. For four months, the family went through a traumatic period. He remembers an occasion when his mother and he were travelling in a train and his mother burst out crying. When the other passengers heard her plight, one gentleman got up and collected some money from the others so that the family would not starve for a few days. Though it was a noble gesture on the part of strangers to help the family, Tara Devi’s pain was much more than poverty. It was the humiliation of having to resort to such charity that pained her, especially since she came from a family of well-to-do farmers. Little Om also inhaled some of this humiliation then.

A year after that Om worked at a dhaba, where he did miscellaneous work and had to wash utensils at night. He was usually bone-tired at the end of the day, so he would hide the utensils beneath the ash in front of the shop and wash them in the morning. One day he was discovered and fired immediately: the owner was afraid the utensils might get stolen at night and couldn’t take risks for a small boy. And so ended Om’s short career.

Patiala is a place most associated with Om, where he spent his formative years. Seeing the plight of their sister, Tara Devi, who could not make ends meet, Tarachand and Ishwarchand decided to lighten her burden and offered to take little Om under their care. But they spelt out clearly that Tek Chand was not welcome. Om would live and work with his maternal uncles’ families and they would look after his education and he could visit his parents during the holidays. So around 1956-57, Om went to live with the Kapoor household in Sanaur, while his parents settled in Ludhiana.