Sunil Dutt started his career at Radio Station; he was an immensely popular announcer on the Hindi Service of Radio Ceylon. From there he advanced to acting in Hindi films and made his debut in the film industry with the film Railway Platform in 1955. He shot to the fame with the film Mother India in which he co-starred with Nargis in 1957. Dutt was one of the soughs stars of Bollywood during the late 1950s and 1960s and starred in many successful films such as Sadhna, Sujata, Mujhe Jeene Do, Khandaan, and Padosan to name a few. 

Dutt landed his first role in the 1955 film Railway Platform directed by Ramesh Saigal. His next films, including the 1956 film Ek Hi Raasta starring Meena Kumari, and Ashok Kumar, among others, did not particularly do well, but Mehboob Khan’s Mother India (1957) changed his fortunes on both professional and personal fronts.

The film centered around Nargis (Radha), who brings up her two children (actor Rajendra Kumar as one of the sons and Sunil Dutt as the other) despite all odds, including poverty and social exploitation. It went into the annals of the Hindi film industry as a historic film garnering critical acclaim for its story and performances.

It was this film that also brought Nargis and Sunil Dutt together. A fire mishap on the sets of the film, which could have cost Nargis her life, was averted when Dutt jumped in to save her. They eventually got married in 1958.

Some of Dutt’s most notable films have also been those that explored different themes and are not just limited to the confines of formula movies.

Gumrah (1963), Waqt (1965), and Hamraaz (1967) were those movies that explored various themes and all these movies were part of a collaboration with director and producer B.R. Chopra and were successful too.

As a producer, Dutt’s two films were released in 1963 — Yeh Raaste Hain Pyaar Ke and Mujhe Jeene Do. Both these movies dealt with non-conventional themes. The first film explored the idea of a woman engaging in adultery (the plot is said to be based on the K.M. Nanavati case in Mumbai, on which actor Akshay Kumar’s 2016 movie Rustom is also based on). In the second film, Dutt’s character was that of a dacoit in love with Waheeda Rehman, thus bringing a humanist angle at a time when films only showed dacoits as devoid of any emotions and feelings.

In 1964, Dutt, in his directorial debut film Yaadein, essentially a one-man act movie made in black and white where he, as the solo character, depicts a narrative by using the combination of artistic elements like background music, silhouettes, and cartoons to portray the situation of a lonely man, who is disappointed to find his wife and children missing after he returns home.

On Yaadein, Manish Gaekwad, in an article in Scroll, writes, “the movie’s mix of arthouse and commercial elements divided critics and moviegoers”.

The film ended up finding a mention in the Guinness Book of World Records for the category of ‘Fewest actors in a narrative film’.

His other films in the coming years such as Padosan (1964), Heera (1973), Pran Jaye Par Vachan Na Jaye (1974), Nagin (1976), Jaani Dushman (1979), Shaan (1980) did well at the box office and also established Dutt as a versatile actor.