Om Puri's death leaves a gaping hole in Indian cinema. Tributes on Twitter

"Chakravyuh mein ghusne se pehle kaun tha main aur kaisa tha, yeh mujhe yaad hi na rahega ... chakravyuh se bahar nikalne par main mukt ho jaon bhale hi, phir bhi chakravyuh ki rachna mein fark hi na padega ... maron ya maaron, maara jaon ya jaan se maardon, iska faisla kabhi na ho payega (Before I entered the chakravyuh who and how was I, I won't remember that ... after getting out of it even if I'm free, even then the structure of the maze will be unaffected ... whether I just die, kill or get killed or take someone's life, that will never be decided)."

                  - Ardh Satya (1983).

Just like his famous cop drama Ardh Satya, where the protagonist struggles with the big bad world around him along with his own frailties, veteran actor Om Puri too had his share of name, fame and shame, and well within the chakravyuh of life.

On Friday, January 6, when the thespian succumbed to a massive heart attack, the world remembered him for some of his brilliant movies such as Aakrosh, Maachis, Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro, besides a host of Pakistani, British and Hollywood films. He was most recently seen in Ghayal Returns (2016).

Puri, along with actors such as Shabana Azmi, Smita Patil, Amol Palekar, Naseeruddin Shah, Kulbhushan Kharbanda, Pankaj Kapoor, Deepti Naval and Farooq Shaikh, had emerged from the Indian parallel cinema wave of the 1970s and 1980s. The news of his death was broken on Twitter by his close friend and filmmaker Ashoke Pandit.

While his career graph always saw a steady but upward curve, the actor who was known for being upfront, was embroiled in a huge controversy in 2011 following wife Nandita’s biography, Unlikely Hero: The Story Of Om Puri.

In the book, Nandita had revealed some of the most disturbing and private details about the actor’s life. She exposed the fact that he had sex with his maid at the age of 14. She wrote about Puri's longstanding liaison with a woman named Laxmi with whom he was sexually and emotionally involved.

At that time, a visibly upset Puri had said, "My wife has reduced a very important and sacred part of my life to cheap and lurid gossip… I don't care if she's my wife. I won't let her get away with it.”

Following the release of the book, things turned ugly between the two. While Nandita had earlier filed a domestic violence case against the actor, the couple finally opted for judicial separation in 2016 after 26 years of marriage.

The actor was also in news last year for his alleged insensitive comment on the Indian Army which he retracted later. Puri is also survived by his son Ishaan.

Actors, directors and others took to Twitter to mourn Puri's demise: