Artwork drawn from the title — how & why
39

Ranked #39 of 100

Bhumika

भूमिका · 1977

An actress moves through men who each want to own her, based on the life of Marathi star Hansa Wadkar.

Director
Shyam Benegal
Year
1977
Genre
Drama
Cast
Smita Patil, Amol Palekar, Naseeruddin Shah, Amrish Puri

Why it's at number 39

Smita Patil's definitive role and one of the most unsentimental films about female autonomy ever made here.

An actress moves through men who each want to own her, based on the life of Marathi star Hansa Wadkar.

Bhumika sits in the 1970s alongside Sholay and Deewaar — a decade this canon treats as foundational.

The Bollywood 100

The essentials

Film record Wikipedia — Bhumika (1977) · data last revised 9 August 2026 · title, year, director and cast are read from that article; this site keeps no independent print record and does not claim one

Editorial The ranking and the case made for each placement — not a measurement · last revised 9 August 2026 · signed by Amit Sharma · the scoring is published in full so the machinery can be argued with, not just the result

No box-office figure, rating or audience score is printed on this page, because none has been independently verified for this film. The dated, sourced money figures the site does stand behind are on the box office page.

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