Suneil Anand, the son of legendary actor Dev Anand, has died at the age of 70 in London following a heart attack.
The family confirmed his death through a statement issued by his niece, Gina Narang.
He died on July 26 at the same London hospital where his father, Dev Anand, had passed away in 2011.
Suneil is survived by his mother, 94-year-old actress Kalpana Kartik, and his sister, Devika, both based in Ooty.
After his acting career did not progress as hoped, Suneil took on the responsibility of running his father’s production banner, Navketan Films.
Navketan was founded in 1949 by Dev Anand and his brother Chetan Anand, and became one of the most respected names in Hindi film production.
Dev Anand was one of Hindi cinema’s most iconic leading men, remembered for films including Guide, Jewel Thief, CID and Hare Rama Hare Krishna over a career of six decades, before his death in 2011 at the age of 88.
Suneil had appeared in a handful of films early in his career before moving away from acting to oversee the family’s production business.
Dev Anand was awarded the Padma Bhushan in 2001 and the Dada Saheb Phalke Award in 2002 for his contribution to Indian cinema, honours reflecting a career that stretched back to the 1940s.
Navketan’s productions also include films directed by Vijay Anand, Dev Anand’s other brother, among them Guide and Jewel Thief, both made under the banner and now regarded as classics of Hindi cinema. Suneil had, in recent years, taken on the work of managing and preserving this catalogue, sustaining the family’s long-running association with Indian film production through a period of considerable change in the industry.
Guide, released in 1965, is frequently cited as one of the most acclaimed films to emerge from Navketan’s decades of production work, and remains a reference point in discussions of the studio’s legacy.
(Image: Press Information Bureau (GODL-India))
