8th MARCH , SAHIR LUDHINAVI'S BIRTHDAY. A SMALL TRIBUTE..
PHAILEE HUYEE HAIN SAPNON KI BAAHEIN ”..... SAHIR AND S D BURMAN …
Sardar Begum ( Died 1976 ) , mother of Sahir Ludhianavi
was from a Kashmiri Muslim family that had settled in Punjab. She was the
youngest child of Abdul Aziz , a Kashmiri contractor of Ludhiana . She was well
known to the family of Shorish Kashmiri and during the communal frenzy of 1947
, she was brought by this family to Lahore from Ludhiana. Sahir’s father , who
had divorced his mother , had also moved to Lyallpur ( Now Faisalabad )from
Ludhaina where he died in 1964.
Sahir was in Delhi when his mother moved to Lahore. He
went to Lahore in September 1947 to bring her back to india. At the same time ,
his close friend Hameed Akhtar had come to Lahore from Mumbai. Hameed insisted
on Sahir’s staying in Lahore . Very reluctantly Sahir agreed and started
editing a newspaper after taking up rented accommodation at Abott Road opposite
Nishaad cinema in Lahore . But he had to pack back when arrest warrants were
issued against him for writing anti establishment editorials including one
wherein he questioned the legitimacy of the 'Two Nation Theory' and attacked
leaders who supported it . His belief in Marxism did not find favour with the
rulers of the new born country . Once arrest warrants were issued against him , Sahir fled
Lahore and returned to Delhi . From Delhi, he requested his friend Prakash
Pandit to go to Lahore to bring back his mother . And Sahir never agreed to the
idea of partition and decided to stay in India. Sahir told his close friends
that the new country created out of the blood of millions of innocent human
beings will unfortunately be ruled by Mullas . In Mumbai ,another poet and
lyricist Raja Mehdi Ali Khan also felt so and decided to stay in India when his
close friend and writer Saadat Hasan Manto left for Lahore .
Staying for some time in Delhi, Sahir
moved to Mumbai. To make both ends meet in Mumbai, he even copied manuscripts
for publishers that also included Krishen Chander’s poorly handwritten pages .
For this he earned Rs150 . With no regular income , he once sold his mother’s
bangles to pay water and electricity bills . In spite of all this, he did not
lose patience .He kept moving from studio to studio for work but did not get a
break or work . And Ishar Kour , the Sikh girl whom he loved during his college
days had also moved to Mumbai. She tried to look for him in vain and was
finally married to a distant cousin by her parents . This all happened before
Sahir landed in Mumbai. No one knows what happened to her thereafter.
And then One day, his friend Mohan Sehgal recommended him
to S D Burman who stayed permanently in GREEN HOTEL located at Khar . Sahir
landed at the Hotel early in the morning and knocked at the door of Burman Dada
's room. Dada was gracious and made him sit comfortably. Sahir introduced
himself and spoke about the purpose of his visit to the hotel . S D Burman
neither knew Urdu nor was much familiar with poetic nuances. He was essentially
a composer . Burman asked Sahir to listen carefully to a tune that he had
prepared for a film song and then pen words to fill up the tune .And Sahir wrote:-
“ Thandi havaayein
Lehra ke Aayein
Ruut Hai jawaan
Tum ko Yahaan
Kaise Bulaayein ….”
A visibly overjoyed Burman jumped from his seat . He took Sahir to producer A R Kardar saying that the desired poet had arrived. When Lata ji sang the song, it was instant hit. Burman ensured Sahir’s song writing in more films including Jaal,Taxi Driver ,Munim ji , Devdass , House No 44, Pyassa and Funtoosh etc. For 1957 superhit movie Pyassa , Guru Dutt ,Sahir and S D Burman pooled their heart and soul .
"PHAILEE HUYEE HAIN SAPNON KI BAAHEIN" ....."My dreams have no boundaries”
House no 44 starring Devanand and Kalpana Kartik, an overjoyed S D
Burman kissed his hands. “Komaal hai ! Komaal hai ! ”Burman kept crying. And
once Lata Ji gave her voice to the song, it turned immortal. Burman had already
composed the tune and Sahir just filled in the words . Sahir’s style of emoting
love in the surroundings of nature was simply remarkable .It gave a broader
horizon to his lyrics. He would use clouds, rain , moonlight , trees , wind,
leaves , rainbow, sunset , dawn, mountains . mist and
many other things to put forth the throb of a lover’s heart . Not many film
lyricists have used this skill .The song shows Kalpana Kartik – the heroine of
the film swinging and dancing around the picturesque trees surrounded with mist
. She certainly conveys the experience of a young girl in the first flush of
love. Burman Dada begins this composition with plucking sitar and the notes
swiftly cascade to make the listener believe that it shall be a song based on
some Hindustani Classical Raga . But then suddenly, we find the sitar making
way for chords played by a guitar and the double bass with a ¾ rhythm. It
shifts almost to a
‘Western Melody’. Suddenly , the sitar returns to tempt once more before Lata
Ji’s golden voice floats over the violins and the flutes. Very creative use of
the rhythms and orchestration in the scale of Shudh Kalyan by Burman Dada. As
the song starts ,Lata Ji’s voice elevates up to the sky with lilting music ,
and – in Sahir’s words – ‘swings on a rainbow to touch the stars’.
Sahir also wrote “ Chup hai dharti “ another beautiful
song for this movie on a tune already prepared by S D Burman.
(Avtar Mota)
CHINAR SHADE by Autarmota is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.5 India License.Based on a work at http:\\autarmota.blogspot.com\.
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