R R Pathak , PRO Our Man In White

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R R Pathak No More
Veteran PRO of Bollywood took his last breath two days back . He was the first lot of PR professional in the Hindi Film industry. If Simi Gerewal was known as Lady in white in Bollywood , our Pathak was man in White . Courteous, polite, thorough profession and always helpful , that was his USP. 
Pathak came from Varanasi fresh from college to try his luck in Hindi films , he was ‘first day first show ‘ kind of movie buff during his school and college days. After a long struggle, and as assistant to portfolio photographer Dhirendra Kishan , he came in contact with film celebrities, started as small time PR person , soon he made his niche place. He worked as publicist for over 300 films in the last 48 years since 1969 when he promoted Tulsi Vivah and also worked for several stars like Vinod Khanna, Kishore Kumar,Tahir Hussain, Sudhakar Bokade, Nasir Hussain, Dinesh Patel,K.C. Bokadia, Kundan Kumar, Mithun Chakraborty and Biswajeet fondly remembers today’s celebrities like Javed Akhtar, Shatrughan Sinha etc and the good old days when he spent time with them when they were nobodies. He loved his profession but always felt that PR is becoming a thankless job today.
Pathak also felt frustrated that today the film stars have no respect for PR or the scribes and are in their own world surrounded by their managers and security guys and accepted that the good old days, when stars used to love to wine and dine journalists, will never be back again.
I have lot of fond memories of Pathak, will  share a small incident. He was PRO of ‘Dil Aashna Hai ‘ , film copied from the American TV miniseries ‘Lace’,  based on the novel of the same name by author Shirley Conran.Hema Malini was producer. Movie was complete and Hema Ji wanted an opinion of impartial film critic before showing it to the distributors, Pathak called me up and fixed up a show, to my surprise there were only three viewers : Hema Ji, Pathak and Me . She asked my opinion after the show , I told straight that it will not be accepted by Indian audience as the social and personal relations were very very Hollywood kind , she did not expect this kind of blunt opinion and was shocked , on other hand Pathak was in a very tight spot , soon he came up with , ‘Boss what can be done?’ I suggested to change the climax , he convinced Hema Ji to reshoot the climax ! 
Pathak used to work as a team with his wife , few years back she left for heavenly abode and Pathak shattered, more over during last fifteen years PR work of films is taken over by Corporte Communication agencies, so the human element is missing now from PR Job and this also made PRO like Pathak less relevant. 
Our fraternity has lost a loveable friend , our Man In White.
Shradhanjali #







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