Saravanan Natarajan writes:
In celebratation of Lata Mangeshkar's birthday today...
Lata's forays in Tamil in the 80s in songs such as Aaraaro aaraaro, valaiyosai gala galavena, engirundho azhaikkum, inge pon veenai for Ilaiyaraja were all hugely successful and found repeated airtime.
However, not may remember that Lata had sung in Tamil way back in the 50s. Presenting here two of those vintage numbers from Vaanaratham.
Vaanaratham was the dubbed Tamil version of the Hindi film Udan Khatola. According to some accounts, the film was produced by Naushad himself. (Vaanaratham came under the banner ‘Naushad Ali Presents’) Udan Khatola-1955 starred Dilip Kumar, Nimmi, Suryakumari, Jeevan, Agha, Nawab, Amar, Roopamala, Tuntun & others. It was scripted by Azmi Bazidpuri and directed by S.U.Sunny.Udan Khatola was a loose adaptation of the classic Lost Horizon, a fantasy adventure novel by James Hilton (also the author of that moving ‘Goodbye, Mr.Chips’). It is a widely acclaimed classic tale of a group of people whose plane crash lands in a remote part of the Himalayas- Shangri-La –a Utopian land where everything is just perfect. Lost Horizon was filmed twice- the 1937 version by Frank Capra, starring Ronald Colman & Jane Wyatt, is considered a landmark film. The 1973 version was a musical by Charles Jarrot, starring Peter Finch & Liv Ullmann.
Udan Khatola is particularly remembered for its enthralling songs. Music by Naushad. Lyrics by Shakeel Badayuni. Songs were sung by Lata Mangeshkar (‘Na ro yae dil kaheen rone se’, ‘Hal ye dil mein kya karoon, ‘Ghar aaya mehmaan koyi’, ‘Mera salaam le jaa’, ‘Sitaron ki mehfil’) & Mohammed Rafi (‘Mohabbat ki raahon mein’, ‘O door ke musaafir’ and ‘Na toofaan se khelo’).
Kambadasan was engaged to write the lyrics for the Tamil songs. Talented as he was, he found it daunting to coming up with plausible lines to match the sequence in synchronization with the preset tunes. Naushad got two of Lata’s songs recorded in the voice of Balasaraswati, the males songs were sung by T.A. Moti, and Lata sang the remaining songs herself.
The sheer sweetness of Lata’s voice overshadowed the errors in pronunciation (her Tamil pronunciation seems to have improved by leaps and bounds when she came back to sing for Ilaiyaraja in the 80s) and the songs became popular. I knew that they were a huge Radio Ceylon draw, for I have heard them being played in the Mandha marutham programme even as late as in the 80s. I was in for a further surprise, though. In 2014, while on a business visit to Penang, I heard ‘En ullam vittu odathey’ (Hamare dil se na jaana in Hindi) being requested for in a listeners' choice program of a local Tamil radio station. The listener who had requested for the song, a woman from Kulim, recalled how as a young girl she had watched Vaanaratham being screened in a make-shift ‘tent’ in a rubber plantation. She said that they were thrilled to hear Tamil songs being sung by Lata. As the aged listener’s raspy voice faded, the dulcet vocals of Lata came on air… Driving across the old Penang bridge (the new one was nearing completion at the time) and listening to the song, I was left ruminating over the timeless appeal of music and the associated memories….
Hamare dil se na jaana:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QbnUqusB1DE
The Tamil equivalent: En ullam vittu odathey:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BmIqHRR01-Q
More sayyanji utrenge paar:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w5SHmpi1NfE
The Tamil equivalent: endhan kannalan karai nokki
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JFHMUuw0NRw
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