Pamela Chopra was the guiding light of YRF. SRK once called her his ‘surrogate mother’

Shortly after Pamela Singh married Yash Chopra in 1971, his brother BR Chopra moved out of the household. It sparked rumours that she was the cause of the rift between the powerful director-producer brothers. But she was the glue that held her family together and the quiet power behind Yash Raj Films.

Years later, she said that the relationship between the two brothers had started to sour before she got married. Soon after his marriage, in 1973, Yash stepped away from his brother’s shadow to start Yash Raj Films. Pamela rarely claimed the spotlight, preferring to remain in the wings. In the Netflix documentary, The Romantics (2023) on YRF’s journey over four decades, she spoke about how important the studio’s first film Daag (1973) was to the family. Yash didn’t sleep for nights ahead of the release of the Rajesh Khanna starrer. It was a box office superhit.

Her previous time on the big screen was when she appeared with Yash Chopra in the opening title credits of Dil To Pagal Hai (1997). Pamela, like her older son, Aditya Chopra, has mostly shied away from the spotlight, though as a playback singer, her voice resonates in films like Kabhie Kabhie (1976), Trishul (1978), Silsila (1981) and Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge (1995)—all YRF movies.

The Romantics gave outsiders an opportunity to discover Pamela Chopra who had been quietly assisting in the building of YRF. She took over and kept it alive and relevant after the death of her husband in 2012.

Over the years, she built an extended family of actors and directors. While receiving the National Yash Chopra Memorial Award in 2017, Shah Rukh Khan said that he was ‘adopted’ by the entire film fraternity, particularly the YRF family  “Pam aunty is like a surrogate mother to me… I have grown up with her,” he said in his speech.

But as a playback singer, and later writer and producer, Pamela was always aware of fickle loyalties in Bollywood.

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A guiding light

Yash and Pamela first met at a cricket event in Delhi, they were seated just a few rows away from each other. But they only spoke for the first time at a sangeet ceremony when Pamela was staying at her cousin actor and former talk show host Simi Garewal’s house in Mumbai. Pamela sang at the event and Yash did not miss the opportunity to compliment her.

“Although she was my maternal cousin, Pamela [Chopra] was like my own sister. We shared rooms when she visited us for four to five months in a year. It was as if my mother [Darshi Garewal] had adopted her as the third daughter,” said Simi Garewal in an interview shortly after Pamela died.

Bollywood veterans knew what fans are only now slowly coming to realise–Pamela was the driving force and guiding light behind Yash Chopra and his films.

“I truly believe it had to do a lot with Pam Aunty’s (Pamela Chopra) influence in his life that drove him to write such beautiful parts for women,” said Rani Mukerji, actor and Pamela’s daughter-in-law, in an interview.

When she did give the rare interview, she never held back. In a 2015 interview with Rediff, she even addressed the rumoured fling Yash had with actor Mumtaz prior to their wedding.

“That was the only question I asked Romesh [common friend of Yash and Pamela] when he met me [to arrange a meeting with Yash]. I asked him what is this thing between Mumtaz and Yash? He said Mumtaz is not a filmi, dainty heroine type at all and they are very good friends. He said there was nothing more. That is not the truth, but never mind,” she said.

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Singer to costume designer 

Pamela Chopra’s first YRF film as a playback singer was Kabhi Kabhie (1976). Since then her voice has been regularly featured in songs such as Khud Se Jo Vada Kiya Tha from Silsila (1981), Meri Banno ki Asyegi Baraat from Aaina (1993) and Ghar Aaja Pardesi from Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge (1995). She wrote the story of Kabhie Kabhi, co-wrote the screenplay of Dil To Pagal Hai (1997) and designed the outfits for Noorie (1979), Silsila and Sawaal (1982).

She was behind Rekha’s plain monochromatic saree looks in Silsila, be it the white saree paired with pearls and a bindi or the plain red sari paired with a sleeveless blouse and wavy hair.

If she had regrets about not taking centre stage she never showed it. Given a choice, Pamela would have happily remained in the background, but her husband’s death in 2012 changed things. She began attending events commemorating Yash Chopra. “My husband is getting awards posthumously. My sons are not willing to go and I don’t want an executive from the office to go and receive the award. So I am forced to make public appearances,” she said.

She even organised a grand premiere of Yash Chopra’s last film, Jab Tak Hai Jaan (2012).

She spent the last few years of her life, truly relishing the role of being a grandmother to Rani Mukerji and Aditya Chopra’s daughter, Adira. “It’s so wonderful to have a baby in the house. I love little babies! They don’t squirm when you pick them up and cuddle and hug them,” she said.

(Edited by Theres Sudeep)