The iconic RK Studios, founded within less than one year of India attaining independence by Raj Kapoor, has finally become history. Located in a sprawling 2.2 acre land area in Chembur in Mumbai, it not only served as another film studio, but was the literal birthplace of a large number of Hindi films that had enriched Indian Cinema spanning over more than six decades. Originally known as RK Films – after the banner name of Raj Kapoor’s film production company – it was renamed as RK Studios in around 1950 after he had made quite a good profit from Barsaat in 1949. Interestingly, the first venture from RK Studios – Aag – was a failure in the box office, and it was the next film Barsaat that actually rained fortunes on Raj Kapoor. As Mihir Bose, a leading film historian had written, in the Mumbai of the 1950s, RK Studios was in a remote rural place far from the centre of the bustling city that is India’s reply to Hollywood. Look at the long list of immortal films the great Raj Kapoor had rolled out from his RK Studios – Awara, Boot Polish, Jagte Raho, Shree 420, Jis Desh Men Ganga Behti Hai, Mera Naam Joker, Bobby, Satyam Shivam Sundaram, Prem Rog and Ram Teri Ganga Maili, etc. When Raj Kapoor passed away in 1988, it was his eldest son Randhir Kapoor who took over the reins of RK Studios, in which he had earlier made his directorial debut – Kal, Aaj aur Kal – in 1971, and that too at a time when his grandfather Prithviraj Kapoor was alive. But then, things were not that smooth for the iconic studio that deserves to be referred to as a heritage site of Indian Cinema. While Randhir Kapoor made a couple of more films there followed by his younger brothers Rajeev Kapoor and Rishi Kapoor making a couple of films each, the latter’s Aa Ab Laut Chalen made in 1999 was the last film to be produced under the RK Studios banner. While it remained shut for the next 18 years or so, it was partially damaged in a fire that broke out in September 2017.All that had perished in the 2017 fire included a makeshift museum (once Nargis’s dressing room) was a treasure trove which had among other things posters from Barsaat, Awaara, Aag, Mera Naam Joker and Bobby znd all other films, a large black umbrella that protected Raj Kapoor and Nargis from the studio rain in the song Pyar hua, ikrar hua in Shree 420, Nargis’s long black dress from Awara, Vyjanthimala’s saris from Sangam, Dimple Kapadia’s funky frocks from Bobby, Padmini’s saris from Jis Desh Mein Ganga Behti Hai, the daffli used in Mera Nam Raju (Jis Desh men Ganga Bahti Hai) and even some of the hats Raj Kapoor wore in his films. The saddest part is that it has been acquired by Godrej Properties, the real estate development company of Godrej Group, which on Friday announced its acquisition of the 2.2-acre property. The company said it would develop a mixed-use project, offering luxury flats and retail space. That brings down the curtains on a major chapter of the history of Indian Cinema. Goodbye RK Studios.