Excellent actors lie on side-lines for years without any break and mediocre ones make decent careers as leading men. That’s showbiz.

Biswajeet belonged to that second fortunate group of mediocre leading men! Fifties and sixties had quite a few such non-actor heroes and they primarily survived – one, because the audiences then were quite tolerant, two, because they had some film industry based relatives as Godfathers and three, because they had some fabulous songs to lip synch making people forget about their acting deficiency.

So riding on the glory of many scintillating songs like Pukarata Chala Hoon Main, Raah Bani Khud Manzil and Beqarar Karke Humein and having his father-in-law and famous singer-composer Hemant Kumar’s ‘Geetanjali Production’ films to fall back on, Biswajeet coolly stayed on for one and a half decade as a hero with a chocolaty, almost androgynous persona.

His diction was faulty and his face practically immobile yet he worked with many top heroines like Waheeda Rehman, Asha Parekh, Sharmila Tagore, Sadhana, Mala Sinha and Rajashree. He was never a runaway success but many of his films like Bees Saal Baad, Kohra, Yeh Raat Phir Na Aayegi, Kismet and Shehnai (apart from the after-mentioned movies) did a fair business. Kahete Hain Mujhko Raja (1975) was his last ditch unsuccessful effort to cling to hero’s image. Later he did some unremarkable character roles.

 In Mere Sanam a millionaire heir’s (Biswajeet) hill-station bungalow is made into a hotel by his manager (Pran). The heir drops in suddenly to find a group of girls staying there and obviously finds a sweetheart (Asha Parekh), who finally turns out to be lost daughter of his guardian (Nazir Hussain). The sixties’ standard formula of first half of comedy and romance in picturesque locales and the second half of in-house sentimentality and suspense works well with O.P.Nayyar’s classic music.

 Sagaai tells a tale of a rich girl (Rajashree) who breaks off her engagement to a crook (Prem Chopra) and against her father’s wishes, marries another man (Biswajeet), in spite of knowing his invalid state after an accident. Nursing for her husband at night and unknown to him, working for family’s survival in the day, she is shattered when the husband accuses her of infidelity. A sob- story after a brief entertaining beginning, the film had a fair run.

Do Kaliyan – an adaptation of ‘Parent Trap’, tells how identical twin sisters (Neetu Singh as a child actress – Baby Sonia) bring together their separated parents (Biswajeet and Mala Sinha) by switching places. Although no patch on Hollywood original, it has some funny moments and some good songs (Bachche Man Ke Sachche and Tumhari Nazar).