Jabalef: Muhammad Ali

Mohammad Ali was a Pakistani actor. He was born on November 10, 1938 into a religious family in Rampur, British India. His father, Maulana Syed Murshid Ali was an Islamic scholar. Muhammad Ali joined Radio Pakistan Hyderabad station as a broadcaster in 1956. He started his film career from film B Chiragh jalta raha as villain. His first film as hero was Shararat (1963). Later, he moved to Lahore and worked in Khandan (1964). He got breakthrough from Khamosh raho (1964). In 1989, he starred in Hindi film Clerk. His last movie screened in 1995 titled as Dum mast qalandar. He had total 277 films (248 Urdu, 17 Punjabi, 8 Pashto, 2 Double version, 1 Hindi and 1 Bengali). He had 28 films as guest appearance and 1 documentary film. He was included among 25 greatest actors of Asia (all time) by CNN survey (On 4 March 2010). Along with Waheed Murad and Nadeem, he remained one of the leading actors of Pakistan film industry. He was known as Shahenshah-e-Jazbaat, means The Emperor of Emotions. On the set of Tum mile pyar mila, Mohammad Ali met actress Zeba, and later both married while the film was still under production. The marriage was held on September 29, 1966. Ali-Zeb, as the couple came to be popularly known, did not have any children together. However, Mohammad Ali legally adopted Samina, Zeba's daughter from a previous marriage, giving her the name Samina Ali. He won 10 Nigar awards in total, one for best supporting actor (Khamosh Raho, 1964) and another special award for Doorian and Bobby in 1984. Others include best actor awards for Kaneez (1965), Aag ka darya (1966), Saiqa (1968), Wehshi (1971), Aas (1973), Aaina Aur Soorat (1974), Insaan Aur Aadmi (1975) and Haidar Ali (1978). Former president Zia ul Haq conferred Pride of Performance on Mohammad Ali in 1984 in recognition of his life-long services to the entertainment industry of Pakistan. He is the only actor who was awarded Tamgha-e-Imtiaz. He was also awarded Naushad Award of India. Mohammad Ali died on March 19, 2006 due to a heart attack in Lahore.