Sayonara to India’s nightingale

Born Hema Mangeshkar – Lata Mangeshkar – dubbed the quintessential nightingale of India – is credited for lending her gifted voice to songs from over 1000 Hindi movies, apart from those in regional and foreign languages. A Bharat Ratna recipient, Lata Mangeshkar’s fans and followers belonged to all walks, including heads of states and various dignatories. But ‘Lata didi’, as she was fondly referred to by those from the film industry, didn’t always feel obliged to entertain those who wished her audience. For instance, when the current president of India Ram Nath Kovind once came to visit her in Mumbai, she refused to see him as she had taken ill. Kovind did get to meet her on another occasion but the veteran playback singer proved that she was hardly one to feel compelled to extend courtesies at the expense of inconveniencing herself.

Revered by her fans and peers alike in a career spanning over 80 years, few know that Mangeshkar was known to have a short temper earlier in her career. And it was this character trait coupled with her straight-talking manner that made her stand up for those she felt had been wronged. For instance, when Filmfare Awards decided to give out the best music director award to Shankar and Jaikishan three years in a row for the film Chori Chori which had hit songs like Aaja Sanam, Jahan Main Jaati Hoon, Panchi Banoo Udti Phiroon, Rasik Balma, and Yeh Raat Bheegi Bheegi among others, Mangeshkar was furious. She even refused to perform at the function when the composer duo requested her to. She was ticked off about the fact that lyricists and singers were not being recognised as awards were only given to composers at the time. “I told them you can just play the music or get someone else to sing. Soon, the head honcho called me up and I repeated what I said before. I was given an argument that Hollywood never gave awards to singers and I told them that Hollywood never had 12 songs in a movie. I told them that when you give awards to singers, I will attend the awards function and also perform at the event irrespective of who gets the award,” Mangeshkar once said in an interview. The playback singer did receive her first Filmfare for Madhumati and so did the lyricist. “Shailendra and other songwriters called me up and thanked me. I was happy that I was useful,” she said.

Mangeshkar was surely one for confrontations and never backed out of an argument. A famous altercation was with another music legend, Mohammed Rafi. Mangeshkar was of the opinion that singers should be allowed to receive a royalty for their songs, something Rafi vehemently disagreed with. At a gathering, Rafi publicly threatened to refuse singing with Mangeshkar if she was firm on her demand for royalties. But Mangeshkar stood her ground and said that she would never sing with Rafi again and informed all her composers that they will need to look for a replacement for her if they wanted to get Rafi to sing their songs. The cold war lasted for a few years. Jaikishan of the SJ duo then got a written apology from Mohammed Rafi and gave it to Lata to end the cold war. That is the kind of clout that Lata wielded. But her ascent to be recognised as the most prolific singing sensation was not an easy one.

Belonging to a family of singers, one would imagine that her career path was carved out early in life. But few know that Mangeshkar was initially compelled to reluctantly consider a career in acting and she did feature in a few Marathi films in supporting roles. “I sang for the first time with my father in shows, but because of the situation in the family, I had to act in Marathi films. It was not that I was doing lead parts but I had no option but to play the sister of the hero or the heroine. I didn’t like it one bit. But it was important for me to work as I was the eldest of four sisters and a brother and my aunt’s daughter and my aunt lived with us too. I wanted to do playback but there weren’t too many opportunities till 1947,” she said.

“My father was a singer. So singing used to happen every day in the house. But he was very conservative. He didn’t like children going to watch plays. He bought all our clothes, bangles, kumkum and the nauvari saree for mother. He was very particular about a lot of things,” she said.

Once Lata became a playback singer, her dream began to take shape. But her struggle was very different. She would often drop in to the Bombay Talkies office, where several film studios had their office, and sit there all day without having a bite to eat. It was only once when an assistant director once enquired if she had had something to eat is when she realised that she hadn’t. “He told me that there was a canteen and took me there. I would always take a train or a tanga or walk till there daily,” she said, reflecting on her formative years as a playback singer.

The most important turning point in Mangeshkar’s early career was lending her voice to the songs in Kamal Amrohi’s 1949 hit Mahal. “Aayega Aanewala changed everything. There was a huge queue of people to sign me after that,” she smiles. But if there’s one song that continues to mesmerise the nation and has become synonymous with patriotic fervour, it has to be Ae Mere Watan Ke Logon. Her most memorable performance of the song was at an event in Delhi in front of a packed audience which included Jawaharlal Nehru.

“I was not well. I had gone to Delhi on January 25. The show was on January 27. But when I started signing, I forgot about everything including myself. What was happening at the border at the time and what the jawans must endure was going through my mind as I sang.”

After the performance, when Mangeshkar resigned to a corner backstage, she was summoned by Mehboob Khan, who invited her to meet Panditji and a young Indira Gandhi. Khan introduced her saying, “Yeh hamari Lata hain. Iska gaana kaise laga?”

And Panditji replied, “Beta tumne aaj mujhe rula diya…” and then he added. “Ghar kab aa rahi ho? Shaam ko aa rahi ho na?” Lata was invited for tea to Nehru’s house but managing to reduce the nation’s first PM to tears with her performance was surely a feat that was embedded in her memory.

Even after Mangeshkar had established herself as one of the most seasoned playback artistes in India, it didn’t alter the singer’s attitude as she remained humble and respected all her peers equally. A testament to this would be when she showed up at music composer Shamir Tandon’s studio with bowls of chicken curry and fish curry. The grand gesture was to apologise to the three-film-old composer for delaying the recording for the song Kitni Ajeeb from Page 3 as she had taken ill at the time and had delayed the recording. She held the composer’s palm and placed it on her forehead to prove that she had a fever and promised to drop in the minute she recovered. As it turned out, Mangeshkar recorded for the hit number the following week.

When this writer directed her sister Asha Bhosle in a few music videos, he was invited to the Mangeshkar home for lunch almost two decades ago — she was upset that this writer was a vegetarian. “I make such good pasanda. I had learnt it from Majrooh Sultanpuri’s wife who would prepare the dish each time I visited their house. The children love it too. You should come home for lunch when you turn non-vegetarian. Don’t eat ghas phoos all the time,” she had said.

Lata not only loved to cook, but she also loved spicy food. “I am not supposed to have mirchi, aachar and dahi, but I end up having it. My father Dinanath Mangeshkar told me that you have to eat what you can’t, but keep doing riyaaz,” Mangeshkar shared.

Despite all her laurels and accolades that justifiable celebrated Mangeshkar’s enviable body of work, the singer often regretted that she couldn’t pursue some of her passions — including photography and painting. “I really wanted to learn both. But work didn’t allow me to. I was also very keen on singing classical music on stage but then I never had the time and even people don’t have the time [for classical music] these days,” she told this writer in an interview once.

S Ramachandran has been a film journalist for over 35 years and has interviewed Lata Mangeshkar several times in his career