Rekha, Amitabh Bachchan and Jaya Bachchan

Of all the off-screen Bollywood love stories, one story that gained the maximum attention and created humongous buzz among the fans was that of Amitabh Bachchan and Rekha. Headlines, news stories, tabloids were filled with the speculations of the love triangle and the havoc that was wreathing in their lives.

While Amitabh Bachchan and Jaya Bachchan always maintained a stoic silence on the issue, their occasional confrontations with Rekha at award shows gives away the awkwardness between them. In a free-wheeling chat with Simi on Rendezvous with Simi Garewal, Rekha had spilled the beans on her equation with Jaya Bachchan and Amitabh.

When Simi breached the topic of the rumours of an alleged relationship between her and Amitabh and asked whether Jaya Bachchan remained unaffected by the rumours, Rekha had said, "Absolutely! I don't think she's a petty person or so insecure." Taking the conversation forward, Simi had said, "Yes, and a woman is so secure because the man has given her the security." To which, pat came Rekha's reply, "Not really." Ahem!

Many years later, when Simi was quizzed about how difficult was it to get Rekha to talk about Amitabh, Simi had said in an interview with Indianexpress, "It was easy asking her the question about Amitabh. If I can ask Jayalalitha if she was ever loved MGR, asking Rekha about Amitabh was much easier. A lot of people ask me how I got her to open up. I didn't know if I did anything special. I don't want to analyse it. I just chatted as good friends. Rekha and I go back a long way."

Jaya and Amitabh's daughter-in-law, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, shares a warm and amicable relationship with Rekha. Even Abhishek Bachchan has always expressed his admiration and love for 'Aunty Rekha' at several occasions.