ISLAMABAD: Famous Urdu and Pashto film hero Badar Munir was remembered on the occasion of his death anniversary on Wednesday. Born in a small village of Shagram in Madyan, Swat, he went to Karachi to work as a rickshaw driver.
Out of 750 movies of Badar Munir’s films, over 80 per cent were in Urdu, while he also acted in 31 Punjabi, 11 Sindhi movies. He was the lead actor in majority of the Pashto movies during over 30 years of his career and also played the hero in some of the flicks in other languages.
The actor, who started his career in showbiz as a lighting technician for a Waheed Murad film, starred in his first Pashto movie in 1970 called Yousuf Khan Sherbano. The hugely successful film directed by Aziz Tabassum not only put Pashto cinema on the map, but also established Akhtar Munir as a hero.
He signed 10 more films after the success of his maiden film and played a major role in the promotion of Pashto films.
In 1972, he also started working in Urdu films. His first Urdu film was ‘Jahaan Baraf Girti Hai’. He acted in many Urdu and Punjabi films. His Urdu film ‘Dulhan Aik Raat Ki’ made him well known all over the country and the film did a record business.
After this, Badar worked in a number of Urdu films. Prominent among them were ‘Dushmani’, ‘Cheekh’, and ‘Multan Khan’. His first Punjabi film was ‘Teen Badshah’.
Badar Munir who had been suffering from kidney and diabetes problems had suffered a heart attack died on October 11, 2008.