Nargis was born as Fatima Rashid in Calcutta, Bengal (now Kolkata, West Bengal). Her father Abdul Rashid (born Mohanchand Uttamchand Tyagi alias Mohan Babu), was originally a wealthy Mohyal Brahmin (a Punjabi Hindu), from Rawalpindi, Punjab (now in Pakistan) who had converted to Islam. Her mother was Jaddanbai, a Hindustani classical music singer and one of the early pioneers of Indian cinema. Nargis's family then moved to Allahabad from West Punjab. She introduced Nargis into the movie culture unfolding in India at the time. Nargis' maternal half-brother, Anwar Hussain (1928–1988), also became a film actor.

Fatima made her first film appearance in the 1935 film Talashe Haq when she was six years old, credited as "Baby Nargis". Nargis (نرگس ) is a Persian word meaning Narcissus, the daffodil flower. She was subsequently credited as Nargis in all of her films.

Nargis appeared in numerous films after her debut; she won lasting fame for her later, adult, roles, starting with at the age of 14, in Mehboob Khan's Taqdeer in 1943 opposite, Motilal. She starred in many popular Hindi films of the late 1940s and 1950s such as Barsaat (1949), Andaz (1949), Awaara (1951), Deedar (1951), Shree 420 (1955), and Chori Chori (1956). She appeared in Mehboob Khan's Oscar-nominated rural drama Mother India in 1957 for which she won the Filmfare Best Actress Award for her performance. Baburao Patel of the film magazine Filmindia (December 1957) described Mother India as "the greatest picture produced in India" and wrote that no other actress would have been able to perform the role as well as Nargis.

After her marriage to Sunil Dutt in 1958, Nargis gave up her film career to settle down with her family, after her last few films were released. She made her last film appearance in the 1967 film Raat Aur Din. The film was well received and Nargis' performance as a woman who suffers from multiple-personality disorder, was critically acclaimed. For this role she won a National Film Award for Best Actress and became the first actress to win in this category. She also received a Filmfare Best Actress Award nomination for this film.

In 2011, Rediff.com listed her as the greatest actress of all time, stating, "An actress with range, style, grace and an incredibly warm screen presence, Nargis is truly a leading lady to celebrate." M.L. Dhawan from The Tribune said, "In almost all her films Nargis created a woman who could be desired and deified. The charisma of Nargis's screen image lay in that it oscillated between the simple and the chic with equal ease."

She was also nominated to the Rajya Sabha (Upper house of Indian Parliament) from 1980–81^[17] but due to cancer she fell ill and died during her tenure.^[18]

Nargis had a long-time relationship with actor Raj Kapoor, who was her co-star in the films Awara and Shree 420. Raj Kapoor was married and had children. After he refused to divorce his wife, Nargis ended their year-long relationship.^[19][20][21]

Nargis married actor Sunil Dutt (a Mohyal from Jhelum, British India) on March 11, 1958. Reportedly, Dutt had saved her life from a fire on the sets of Mother India.^[22] She changed her legal name to "Nirmala Dutt" after they married on 11 March 1958.^[23] Three children were born from their union: Sanjay, Namrata, and Priya.

Sanjay went on to become a successful film actor. Namrata married actor Kumar Gaurav, son of veteran actor Rajendra Kumar who had appeared alongside Nargis and Sunil Dutt in Mother India. Priya became a politician and a Member of Parliament (Lok Sabha).^[22]

With her husband, Nargis formed the Ajanta Arts Cultural Troupe, which involved several leading actors and singers of the time, and performed at remote frontiers to entertain the Indian soldiers at border. It was the first troupe to perform in Dhaka, after the liberation war of Bangladesh in 1971.^[3] Later, Nargis worked for the cause of spastic children. She became the first patron of The Spastics Society of India. Her charitable work for the organisation got her recognition as a social worker.^[3]

Nargis was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and underwent treatment for the disease at Memorial Sloan–Kettering Cancer Center in New York.^[22] Upon her return to India, her condition deteriorated, and she was admitted to Breach Candy Hospital in Bombay. She went into a coma on 2 May 1981 and died the next day.^[22] Less than a week after her death, on 7 May 1981, at the premiere of her son's debut film Rocky, one seat was kept vacant for her.^[22]

Nargis was buried at Badakabarastan in Marine Lines, Bombay. A street in Bandra, Mumbai was renamed Nargis Dutt Road in her memory.

• 1957 – Filmfare Best Actress Award for Mother India
• 1958 – She was the first film actress to conferred by the Government of India with the Padma Shri title, the fourth highest civilian award.^[5]
• 1968 – National Film Award for Best Actress for Raat Aur Din.^[5]
• 1969 – Nominated, Filmfare Best Actress Award for Raat Aur Din
• 2001 – "Best Artists of the Millennium" award by Hero Honda and film magazine Stardust along with actor Amitabh Bachchan.^[24]

The National Film Awards honoured Dutt by instituting the Nargis Dutt Award for Best Feature Film on National Integration upon her achievement in Hindi Cinema.^[25]

• Mr. and Mrs. Dutt: Memories of our Parents, Namrata Dutt Kumar and Priya Dutt, 2007, Roli Books. ISBN 978-81-7436-455-5.^[26]
• Darlingji: The True Love Story of Nargis and Sunil Dutt, Kishwar Desai. 2007, Harper Collins. ISBN 978-81-7223-697-7.
• The Life and Times of Nargis, T. J. S. George. 1994, Harper Collins. ISBN 978-81-7223-149-1.