Скачать или смотреть The Most Expensive Wedding of the Year: When Vyjayanthimala Became Mrs. Chaman Lal Bali

1968. A year when India was still dreaming in black-and-white on screen but living in vivid Technicolor off it. That year, the country’s most expensive wedding didn’t belong to a royal family or a business tycoon. It belonged to the reigning queen of Indian cinema: Vyjayanthimala.
She was the first South Indian actress to conquer Bollywood. A classical dancer who could match steps with Dilip Kumar, act with Raj Kapoor, and silence critics with her grace. By 1968, at the peak of her career, Vyjayanthimala shocked the nation – not by signing a new film, but by marrying the man she loved: Dr. Chaman Lal Bali, a handsome, already-married Delhi-based physician with a young son.
The wedding took place on 6 March 1968, but it wasn’t just a ceremony – it was a spectacle. Two grand receptions followed: one in Delhi, one in Bombay. The guest list read like the who’s who of India – Raj Kapoor, Dilip Kumar, Nargis, Sunil Dutt, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s close circle, industrialists, and even the Maharani of Jaipur.
The bride wore a gold-embroidered red Banarasi saree so heavy with real zari that it needed two people to carry the pallu. Her jewellery? Not borrowed. Not sponsored. Pure hereditary gold and polki diamonds worth crores even by today’s standards. The food? Catered by Delhi’s finest – 56 dishes, including rare Kashmiri and Punjabi delicacies flown in especially.Estimates of the wedding cost in 1968 ranged between ₹18–25 lakhs – an astronomical sum when a luxury car cost ₹15,000 and an average Indian earned ₹200 a month. Adjusted for inflation, that’s easily over ₹200–300 crore today. Yes, this was the Ambani wedding of its time – only quieter, classier, and drenched in old-world elegance.
But behind the grandeur was a love story that defied every rule.They met in 1957 when Vyjayanthimala injured her ankle during the shooting of Sadhna. Dr. Chaman Lal Bali, a reputed physician, treated her. What began as doctor-patient turned into friendship, then love. He was already married. She was a superstar. Society called it scandal. They called it destiny.
For years, they kept their relationship hidden. Then, in 1968, Dr. Bali divorced his first wife (with mutual consent and proper settlement), and Vyjayanthimala quietly became Mrs. Vyjayanthimala Bali.
She announced her retirement from films the same year. Not because she had to – but because she wanted to.Vyjayanthimala Bali never looked back. She raised her stepson and her own son with equal love, supported her husband, returned to Bharatnatyam, won a Padma Vibhushan, and served as a Member of Parliament.
The woman who once danced as Nagin and Chandramukhi chose a quiet life in Chennai with the man she loved.In an era when heroines were expected to fade away after marriage, she didn’t fade – she transformed.
And that, perhaps, was the most priceless part of the most expensive wedding India had ever seen.


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