Nighat Sultana

Nighat's father, Hasan Ali, was from a Bengali family who worked in the army and was sent to Iraq during World War I; there he married an Iraqi Kurd woman.^[1] Nighat was born in 1935 in Kurdistan, Iraq.^[1] When Nighat was fourteen years old her parents left Iraq and settled in Pakistan at Karachi.

Nighat's father wanted her to become a doctor. She studied nursing and became a nurse and worked in an army hospital before joining films. After some time, her father Hasan suffered from an ailment that rendered him blind. Nighat became the only earner of the family, but the money was not enough and she decided to go to Lahore in the hopes of becoming an actress.^[1]

In 1953, Nighat went to Lahore and there she met director Aslam Irani, who cast her in his film Tarrap, also starring Sudhir, Shammi and Allauddin.^[3]

She made her debut as an actress in 1953.^[4] She appeared in the films Pasban, Nooran, Teray Baghair, Insaf, Tamanna, Rahguzar and Mitti Dian Moortan.^[5] In 1962, her role of a handicapped woman of a poor family from the Walled City of Lahore in Riaz Shahid's Susral earned her critical acclaim.^[6] Then she changed her name to Nighat Sultana and later appeared in the films Pazeb, Koh-e-Noor, Afshan, Salgira, Jaisay Jantay Nahin and Afsana Zindagi Ka.^[7] In 1956, she played the leading role in the country's first Sindhi language film Umar Marvi.^[8] Since then she appeared in films Zanjeer, BeGunah, Sukh Ka Sapna, Lakhpati, Jan-e-Bahar and Shehbaz.^[9]

She married director Hassan Tariq in 1959 soon after the release of the film Neend. They had first met on the set of 1957 film Saat Lakh, where he was working as chief assistant director.^[10] She had two children with Hassan Tariq, a son named Tahir Hassan and a daughter actress Reena. Hassan divorced her in 1961 and she took custody of her children.^[11]

Nighat died at her home in Karachi in 16 December 2002.