8 Very Popular Muslim Bollywood Actors Who Adopted Hindu Screen Names

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Bollywood has seen a whole lot of stars going in for a change of name as their original names were either old-fashioned or unattractive. To avoid clashes with other star names and make it more trendy and catchy some actors and actresses went on to change their names completely. Some actors being Hindus transformed their names to Hindu names whereas some Muslims went on to adopt Hindu screen names for reasons best known to them. Take a look at some famous Muslim Bollywood actors and actresses who decided to rechristen themselves to Hindu screen names.

1. Meena Kumari (Mahjabeen Bano)

Meena Kumari was known as the tragedy queen. She was born as Mahjabeen Bano in a Sunni Muslim family in 1933. She started her career as a child artiste in 1939 and was rechristened as Baby Meena by director Vijay Bhatt. The name stuck as she later became Meena Kumari once she started doing lead roles.

2. Dilip Kumar (Muhammad Yusuf Khan)

The actor who is popularly known as ‘Tragedy King’. Dilip Kumar was born as Mohammad Yusuf Khan in a Pathan-family in Peshawar, Pakistan. Dilip Kumar is his screen name. He initially joined Bollywood by assisting the script department of Bombay Talkies where he met top actress Devika Rani who requested him to change his name to Dilip Kumar. This later led him to play the lead in ‘Jwar Bhata’ and the rest became history.

3. Madhubala (Mumtaz Jehan Dehlavi)

Madhubala was born as Mumtaz Jehan Dehlavi in a Pashtun family in Swabi district of North-West Frontier Province of Pakistan in 1933. She is considered to be one of the most beautiful actresses to have worked in the industry and is highly regarded as “The Venus of Indian Cinema” and “The Beauty with Tragedy”.

4. Sanjay (Shah Abbas Khan)

In the beginning of his career Sanjay Khan started off using the name Sanjay in films like ‘Dosti’, ‘Haqeeqat’ and ‘Dus Lakh’ though his real name was Shah Abbas Khan. Later as he became successful he suffixed ‘Khan’ to his name. Sanjay became an actor and director of repute in the 60’s, 70’s and 80’s.