New Delhi: Aishwarya Rai Bachchan turns 45 today and it wouldn't be wrong to say that she is one of Bollywood's most loved actresses (the many birthday posts prove that).

On her special day, her closest friends, colleagues and fans posted wishes on the social media, expressing their love and shared some of the cutest message for the actress, but it was actress Preity Zinta's post that stole our heart.

Preity struck gold in her photo archive and shared a lovely throwback picture of herself with Aishwarya and wrote: "Happy Birthday to my darling Aishwarya Rai Bachchan.

Loads of love, happiness, sexiness and laughter always.

Love you loads." She added hashtags such as "#Birthdaygirl" and "#friendsforever."  Preity and Aishwarya were contemporaries in the late Nineties and early 2000's.

They never co-starred in a film.

However, Preity has worked with Aishwarya's actor-husband Abhishek Bachchan in the 2007 film Jhoom Barabar Jhoom.

Preity is often seen documenting her admiration for Aishwarya on social media.

Two years ago, Preity had an adorable Twitter conversation with Abhishek Bachchan, in which she confessed that she had a "girl crush" on Aishwarya.

She wrote: "I'm watching the Ae Dil Hai Mushkil promo in a loop and I think I have a girl crush on Aish."This is what we are talking about:  Meanwhile, make-up artist Mickey Contractor also shared a stunning grey scale picture of Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, from her modelling days on his Instagram profile and wrote: "Happy Birthday Beautiful."  Not a throwback picture per say, but Madhuri Dixit's picture with her Devdas co-star is equally cute.

In the picture, Madhuri can be seen embracing the birthday girl and wrote: "Sending you my love and good wishes on your birthday.

May you have a blessed year ahead filled with love, joy and happiness."  Fashion Designer Manish Malhotra, too shared a stunning picture of himself with the actress, which appears to be from a fashion show and wrote: "Happy happy birthday dearest Aishwarya, stay this fabulous and beautiful always."  On the work front, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan will next be seen in Anurag Kashyap's Gulab Jamun, co-starring Abhishek Bachchan.

Aishwarya reportedly dropped Jasmine from her projects line up.

She was last seen in Fanney Khan, co-starring Anil Kapoor and Rajkummar Rao.