When Dimple's kiss with Rishi Kapoor created controversy

Imagine being a regular teenager on day, and the next, the whole country is copying your style! That's exactly what happened to Dimple Kapadia after her movie Bobby hit the screens. Suddenly, everyone wanted her short skirts and the way she knotted her polka-dot shirts.
Then, in a real-life fairy tale twist in 1973, this 15-year-old fan married the reigning king of Bollywood, the superstar Rajesh Khanna, who was twice her age at 30! Their love story blossomed, and soon they welcomed two adorable daughters, Twinkle Khanna and Rinke Khanna. And just like that, Dimple, the dazzling new star, stepped away from the bright lights of the film industry to embrace her new role as a wife and mother.
A Bold Comeback After Separation
However, the actress separated from Rajesh Khanna in 1982 and two years later, in 1984, she made a bold comeback into films with Ramesh Sippy's Saagar. The film starred Rishi Kapoor opposite her.

While her comeback film featured her in a swimsuit – a decision seen as daring for a mother – Dimple preferred to focus on the movie's overall quality rather than just that particular scene. She believed that motherhood shouldn't be a barrier to an actress making a comeback.
Rekindled On-Screen Chemistry and Off-Screen Buzz
During the filming of Bobby, there were strong rumours linking her romantically with Rishi. Their captivating on-screen connection in the film fueled speculation about a real-life romance between the two young actors. In Saagar, Dimple and Rishi shared a few kissing scenes, which were considered quite bold and drew considerable attention from the audience at the time.

Rishi was reportedly concerned that the intimate scenes he filmed with Dimple might make his wife,

Neetu Kapoor

, feel insecure. To avoid this, he decided not to tell her about the kissing scene in their movie. However, Neetu's reaction after the film's premiere was quite unexpected. Instead of being upset, she told Rishi that she was unimpressed with his kissing and jokingly said he seemed like a bad kisser, much to his relief.
After Bobby became a massive success, the pairing of Rishi and Dimple was incredibly popular, and gossip columns buzzed with rumours of a romantic relationship between them.

Years later, in his autobiography, Khullam Khulla, Rishi revealed that Neetu admitted feeling insecure when he and Dimple were cast together again in the film Saagar. However, Rishi clarified in his book that Neetu had no reason to worry. He explained that while his relationship with Dimple might have been slightly more than just friendship during the making of Bobby, a decade had passed since then. At the time of Saagar, Dimple was a mother of two, navigating life after her marriage, and Rishi himself was happily married with two children.
Fading Stardom and a Difficult Decision
After Dimple and Rajesh Khanna had been married for some time, Rajesh's movies started to flop in the 1970s and 1980s. This made the once hugely popular actor struggle with failure, and it created problems in his relationship with Dimple. Even though Dimple tried hard to fix their marriage, she couldn't, and they separated in 1984. Later, Dimple confessed that marrying such a big star had been a mistake.