Poonam Dhillon

Biography

Poonam Dhillon is a famous and celebrated Indian bollywood movie actress.Her father?s name is Amrik Singh and her mother?s name is Gurcharan Kaur. She has a younger sister named Dr. Rishma Dhillon-Pai who is a gynecologist based in Bombay.

She did her schooling from Carmel Convent High School, Chandigarh,India

She first gained fame when she was crowned the beauty queen title of "Miss India" in 1977. Famous director Yash Chopra noticed her and gave her a romantic role in the star-studded hit film "Trishul" (1978) where the famous song "Gapoochi Gapoochi gum gum" was picturized on her and she came to be known as the "Gapoochi Gapoochi gum gum" girl.

Yash Chopra was enthralled enough with her to give her the title role in Noorie (1979), which he produced but didn?t direct. The film became a major hit and earned Poonam a Filmfare nomination as Best Actress.It also catapulted her to the ranks of upcoming heroines in the late seventies and early eighties.

Subsequently she did about 90 films in Hindi like "Sohni Mahiwal", "Red Rose", "Teri Kasam", "Dard", "Nishana", "Yeh Vada Raha", "Samunder", "Romance", "Kasam", Sitamgar, etc. She did a cameo in the hit film Judaii (1996) as a favor to producer Boney Kapoor after Juhi Chawla dropped out.

She also ventured out to do regional films, such as the Bengali film "Nyay Danda," Kannada film "Yudha Kanda" and Telegu film "Ishtam.She has also done Hindi theater. She worked in a super hit comedy play "The Perfect Husband" which won best comedy play award in 2005 and which recently completed Golden Jublee run.

She pioneered "VANITY " a make up van company in India and runs a successful Make up Van Business.Besides introducing the concept of Makeup vans in India, Poonam Dhillon has been one of the first to start a website. She has been very active with a lot of social causes like Drug awareness, Aids awareness, Family Planning, Organ Donation etc. She also is involved in running an events company.

She married film producer Ashok Thakeria in 1988, with whom she has two children, son Anmol and daughter Paloma. The marriage ended in divorce in 1997.

She briefly joined the Indian national Congress party in 2004.