Bollywood’s fascination for the mystical number 786

	EID MUBARAK

On the auspicious occasion of ‘Eid Al Fitr’ Glamsham.Com looks into the Bollywood’s fascination for the mystical Islamic number 786 and reveals who started the trend in Bollywood.

Well the credit for popularizing the mystical number 786 goes to Bollywood’s most successful writer pair Salim Javed, who used it first time in their movie DEEWAAR, in which Amitabh Bachchan played a Coolie and has the badge number 786.

AMITABH BACHCHAN IN COOLIE

The highlight of the movie was that Salim Javed explained the significance of the number 786 in a scene where Karim Chacha, a fellow senior collie enlightens Amitabh Bachchan about the literal meaning of the number. He informs him that just as Hindu brethren have faith in Om, a Trishul, a Swastika or Christians revere a Cross likewise the number has immense significance in Islam. The number denotes blessing of Allah and is the opening line of the holy Quran. The number signifies ‘Bismillah al-Rahman al-Rahim’ which means in the name of Allah, the compassionate, the merciful.

After the success of the movie, not only the non-Muslim, even many Muslims who were not aware of its meaning began revering the number. In fact the number became the most sought after number. People pay extra premium to acquire the auspicious number be it for a car plate number, currency, bank account number etc.

Bollywood too was fascinated by its magnificence. Manmohan Desai used the number once again as Amitabh Bachchan’s badge number in COOLIE. Yash Chopra used it as Shahrukh Khan’s jail number in VEER-ZAARA. In recent times Akshay Kumar’s hit movie KHILADI 786 proved the magic of the number.

Even in Ekta Kapoor’s hit movie ONCE UPON A TIME IN MUMBAI, Ajay Devgan, who plays a Muslim character has his car plate number MRH 786. The craze is not limited to Bollywood, down South too filmmakers have used the mystical number 786 in many movies like in Rajnikant’s THEE (Tamil), Chiranjeevi’s KAIDHI NUMBER 786 (Telugu), Ajith Kumar’s Mankatha (Tamil) etc. The list does not end here as there are many more movies which have minted money employing the spiritual number.