Veteran actress Jahanara Bhuiyan, widely known for portraying motherly roles on screen, passed away on the evening of August 25 while undergoing treatment at a hospital in Minnesota, US. She was 68. Her family confirmed the news to the media.
According to family sources, she had long been suffering from multiple health complications. Both her kidneys had failed due to diabetes and she had been receiving treatment at the Lake Ridge Care Center in Minnesota for the past 16 months. Despite regular dialysis, her condition did not improve.
Active in the film industry during the 1970s and 1980s, Jahanara Bhuiyan built a diverse career as an actress, lyricist, producer and director. She began her journey as a lyricist with her husband, freedom fighter and director Sirajul Islam Bhuiyan’s film ‘Nimai Sannyasi’.
She gained wide recognition in the 1980s through her performance in ‘Sot Ma’ and went on to appear in over a hundred films. She also directed several works, including Sindur Niona Muchhe (1993).
Jahanara Bhuiyan was the sister of late film director Aziz Ahmed Babul and is remembered as one of the pioneering female filmmakers in Bangladesh after independence.
While Manjan Ara Begum (Rebecca) became the first female director in 1970 with ‘Bindu Theke Britto’, Jahanara was among the women who carried that legacy forward in the post-independence era.