And they came together ….

 

‘Barsaat’ ((1949) was the starting point for these foursome. How they met to form the most enduring musical partnership was an accident of fate and that accident was in a way masterminded by another artist called Raj Kapoor, a man with amazing creative talent and vision. How incensed Raj Kapoor fired his composer Ram Ganguly for trying to ‘sell off’ a ‘Barsaat’- tune to another producer and on the spot offered the stunned assistant Shankar, (who had actually composed that tune), the vacant post of composer and how Shankar made a passionate plea to also include his friend Jaikishan as his composer partner, are real life events endowed with all bestseller pot-boiler elements of deceit, drama and daring gallantry. 

 

When Iqbal Hussain left his home- town Jaipur for Bombay in 1940, he had only a wish, a hasrat but that was just to find an odd job to make ends meet. Never did he have an inkling that he would get such fame as a film-songwriter and a new name to go with it - Hasrat Jaipuri. Initially he worked as a bus conductor and even as a part time toy-seller. He himself said, “I was quite illiterate except knowing something about Urdu shairi.”  To satisfy his literary cravings he visited mushairas and recited poetry. His talent was spotted by Vishwa Mehra – Raj’s uncle who brought him into ‘Prithvi’ theatres. There Raj Kapoor got acquainted with him and used his lyrical ability for the first time in ‘Barsaat’. Hasrat wrote eight of the ten super-hit songs in that movie. In fact, the very first song he penned was Lata’s Jiya beqarar hai –the same song that led to the dramatic sacking of Ram Ganguly!

 

Born in Ravalpindi on 30th august 1923 and brought up in Mathura, Shankardas Kesrilal Shailendra also came to Bombay in the forties in search of work. He started off as a mechanic in railways but managed to keep his love for poetry intact.  Raj Kapoor was impressed by this poetic passion when he saw Shailendra recite a patriotically charged poem ‘Jalta hai Punjab’ and asked if he could write film songs for the R.K. film ‘Aag.’ Shailendra refused flatly saying ‘My poetry is not for sale.’ But worsening financial situation forced him to forego his reservations. He came back to Raj, who was now in the process of making ‘Barsaat’ and asked ‘Is your offer still on?’ To Raj’s credit, he welcomed this new talent -who had so audaciously refused his generous offer earlier- with open arms. The quartet was complete. Shankar, Jaikishan, Hasrat and Shailendra were not only to come together for that one film but were to go on and on as a team to create some of the greatest Hindi film songs.

 

The R.K. connection:

 

Looking at their careers, it becomes well apparent that although these four artists did not limit their creativity within the confines of R.K. banner, they almost always managed to create something extra-special for a Raj Kapoor film – whatever banner it carried. In a way, they were repaying Raj’s debt for giving them the break-through.

 

So take any major R.K. film – ‘Barsaat’, ‘Awara’, ‘Aah’, ‘Boot polish’, ‘Shri 420’, ‘Jis desh mein Ganga beheti hai’, ‘Sangam’ or “Mera naam joker’ or even take any Raj Kapoor film outside R.K.banner like ‘Chori chori’, ‘Anari’, ‘Ek dil, sau afsane’, ‘Aashiq’, ‘Main nashe mein hoon’, ‘Deewana’ or ‘Teesri kasam’ and you would find so many instances of these special ‘concoctions’ by the foursome for their ‘chosen one’!

 

In ‘Barsaat’, for that superb Lata – Mukesh duet ‘Patli kamar hai’, Shailendra wrote such stylishly restrained yet boldly evocative words depicting the hero’s carefree, Casanova- attitude when he said:

 

“Main chanchal madmast pawan hoon

Jhoom jhoom har kali ko chumoon.”

 

The same Shailendra expressed a diametrically opposite, shy lovey-dovey emotion when he wrote in ‘Awara’:

 

“Dam bhar jo udhar munh phere o chanda

Main unse pyar kar loonga, baatein hazaar kar loonga.”  

 

Hasrat came up with brilliantly witty posers in ‘Shri 420’ fun-song ‘Ichak daana bichak daana’. Especially the last one was a riot when Raj sings:

 

‘Chaalein woh chalkar dilmein samaaya

Khaa-pee gaya woh kiya hai safaaya.

Tum bhi isse bachkar rahena, chakkar mein na aana, ichak daana.

 Bolo kaun?’

 

With a puzzled look on her face, Nargis innocently guesses, ‘Ghum?’ and Raj answers mischievously – ‘Unh-huh. Hum!” 

 

In ‘Sangam’, Hasrat’s easygoing penmanship was an integral part of the immensely successful Rafi solo ‘Yeh mera prempatra padhkar.’  Lines like

 

‘Tujhe main chaand kaheta tha, magar usmein bhi daag hai

Tujhe suraj main kaheta tha, magar usmein bhi aag hai’

 

made it so easy for the listener to get into that romantic mood. 

 

The working pattern:

 

Shailendra worked mainly with Shankar and Hasrat with Jaikishan. Apart from the  personal preference and proximity related to friendship, this division of work was more in accordance with the composition patterns of the two composers. Shankar always loved composing serious thematic songs with a lot of emotional content that only Shailendra could do justice to whereas Jaikishan was more into composing light- hearted romantic stuff that came so naturally to Hasrat.

 

An interesting example of this is seen in ‘Anari’ where Shailendra writes the emotionally charged thematic title-song :

 

‘Sab kuchh seekha humne na seekhi hoshiyari

Such hai duniyawalon ke hum hain Anari.’

 

Whereas Hasrat pens another softer, romantic title song:

 

‘Woh chaand khila, woh taare hanse, yeh raat ajab matwali hai

Samajhanewale samajh gaye hain, naa samajhe woh Anari hai.’

 

Except for ‘Aarzoo’, where Hasrat wrote all songs and Jaikishan composed them all, always both, Hasrat and Shailendra, remained a permanent fixture in a S-J soundtrack. Oh yes, how could I forget the only instance when the two lyricists found themselves out of S-J favour. It was in the eminently forgettable soundtrack- ‘College girl’, when S-J had opted for Rajendra Krishna who penned songs like ‘Hum aur tum aur yeh sama lovely, lovely, lovely’! 

 

Shailendra – Class personified:

 

Shailendra’s lyrics were in a class of their own. He had versatility as well as an uncanny ability to present some unusually profound thoughts in simplest of words. This ability of his not only made him a lyricist par excellence but it also gave a long lasting literary, poetic value to his film songs. He mostly used pure Hindi, rarely resorting to Urdu.

 

Look at these gems. In the title song for ‘Jis desh mein Ganga baheti hai’, he wrote

 

‘Kuchh loag jo jiada jaanate hain,

 insaan ko kam pahechante hain

Yeh purab hai, purabwaale har jaan ki keemat jaanate hain’

 

And suddenly the concept of humanity became so simple and genuine. In ‘Anari’ song ‘Jeena isika naam hai’, he expounded the same humanitarian theme when he said,

 

‘Rishta dil se dil ke aitbaar ka, 

zinda hain hum hi se naam pyar ka

Ke marke bhi kisi ko yaad aayenge, 

kisi ke aansuon mein muskurayenge

Jeena isi ka naam hai.’

 

Then, in ‘Amrapali’ song ‘Jao re jogi tum jao re’, he defined the limit or rather the limitlessness of knowledge in such a philosophical way:

 

‘Gyaan ki kaisi seema gyaani

Gaagar mein saagar ka paani.’

 

And who could really miss the beauty of his soft, romantic touch in the ‘Raj hath’ song by Lata -‘Mere sapne mein aana re sajana’, when he came up with something as original and as playful as:

 

‘Chupchup aake piya baithna sirhaane,

 jaan ke main chup rahungi neend ke bahaane

Mujhe chhed ke jagaana re, sajana, mere sapne mein aana re!’

 

Hasrat: Popular romanticism:

 

Hasrat was a master of romance. Love-songs came naturally to this man who admitted unashamedly that the first time he started writing shairi in his adolescence was just to impress his neighbourhood lady-love, Lajo!  But it also must be admitted that though what he wrote as film songs became extremely popular, in terms of literary class, he was never in the same league as Shailendra. 

 

Hasrat had a habit of conjuring the most exotic adjectives while addressing the lady-love through his songs. So heavy Urdu words like ‘Chashme baddoor’, ‘Husn-pari’, ‘Gul-badan’, ‘Nargis-e-mastana’ frequented his songs repeatedly and gave them a unique identity. 

 

Even with his more box-office oriented approach, he carved some beautiful lyrics befitting the situations. Like in ‘Raat aur din’ title song, he captured the emotional turmoil so well in:

 

‘Khud nahi jaanoo dhoondhe kisko nazar, 

kaun disha hai mere man ki dagar

Kitna ajab yeh dil ka safar, 

nadiya mein aaye jaaye jaise lahar’.

 

In the ‘Rajkumar’ Rafi-song ‘Is rang badalti duniya mein’, he so delightfully showed that extremely sensitive and suspicious side of lover’s mind:

 

Main kaise khuda hafiz kah doon

Mujh ko to kisi ka yakeen nahi

Chhup jaao hamari aankhon mein

Bhagwan ki neeyat theek nahi!

 

In ‘Brahmchari’ song – again a Rafi stunner- ‘Dil ke jharokhe mein’, he brought forth all the intensity and pain of a lost lover bidding the final adieu by saying,

 

‘Kal tere jalwe paraye bhi honge, 

lekin jhalak meri aankhon mein hogi

Phoolon ki doli mein hogi tu rukhsat,

 lekin mahek meri saanson mein hogi.’

 

Friends in real life:

 

The superb chemistry between these four was not merely because they were great artists all. It was more because they were all great friends and great companions who enjoyed each other’s company to the fullest. So many songs came into being based on their real life co-experiences. Like the ‘Shri 420’ song ‘Mud mud ke na dekh mud mud ke’ was an on-the-spot creation by Shailendra who was teasing Jaikishan for looking back repeatedly at a passer-by - a beautiful lady, of course! ‘Ramaiya vasta vaiya’  from the same film sparked off when these friends going on a walk happened to listen to a folk-song sung by some building-workers nearby. 

 

Once after a small tiff with the composer duo, Shailendra wrote wistfully, 

 

‘Chhoti si yeh duniya, pahechane raaste hain

Kabhi to miloge, kahin to miloge, to poochhenge haal!’

 

Later that became a hit song in ‘Rangoli’.

 

 

The 60’s and ‘Shammi-phenomenon’:

 

Enter the sixties and a new star emerged on the horizons. He was Raj’s brother Shammi Kapoor. His emergence was to soon change the film music scenario drastically. Male dominance and borrowed ideas became a norm. Elvis and Beatles had brought in heavy Rock n’Roll influence and S-J music was quick to adapt and adopt these western ideas. 

 

Agreed that ‘Shammi phenomenon’ was born as a result of O.P.Nayyar’s magic in ‘Tumsa nahi dekha’ (1957) but still it must be said that it reached its peak only when Prayag Raj screamed ‘Yaahoo’ and Rafi joined in with a racy ‘Chahe koi mujhe junglee kahe’ in S-J’s ‘Junglee’ (1961).  Quite surprisingly it was the ‘serious’ Shailendra who wrote this song and also the another crackerjack ‘Aiyayya karoon main kya, suku suku.’ For Shammi Kapoor’s aggressive romantic celluloid image, nobody contributed more than these four along with of course, the peerless Rafi. ‘Jaanwar’, ‘Badtameez’, ‘Pagla kahin ka’, ‘Professor’, ‘Prince’, ‘Rajkumar’, ‘Brahmchari’, ‘An evening in Paris’ - all these Shammi- movies were studded by songs by S-J, Shailendra and Hasrat. Although these songs were successful in popularity charts, they were short on class and emotional depth.

 

This phenomenon finally led to decline and fall of this musical empire. As more and more rhythm-oriented songs alienating themselves from melody started pouring in for Shammi Kapoor movies and their countless clones, the quality of music and lyrics both suffered. The melody paved way for cacophony and lyrics were reduced to meaningless permutations and combinations of hollow and even cheap words. Songs like ‘Kiss…kisko pyar karoon’, ‘O-o-o-o baby doll’ and ‘Jaan pahechan ho’ were prime examples of this rut setting in.

 

In a song from the movie ‘Love marriage’, Shailendra had once taken a swipe at a famous composer (who over-relied on rhythm and with whom he never worked) by saying:

‘Tin canister peet peet kar galaa faadkar chillana

Yaar mere mat bura maan, yeh na gaana hai na bajaana hai’!

 

But sadly the S-J music itself was falling into the same trap and becoming a caricature of itself. The sweetness of ‘Barsaat’, ‘Chori chori’, ‘Raj hath’, ‘Aurat’, ‘Poonam’ and ‘Patraani’ was a thing of the past. Loud orchestration and plain populism had taken over.

 

The ‘Sangam’ misunderstanding:

 

When Amin Saayani’s ‘Binaca geet maala’- then a litmus test for popularity- selected Rafi’s ‘Yeh mera prem patra padhkar’  from ‘Sangam’ for the top spot over Mukesh’s ‘Dost dost na raha’ from the same film, the seeds of dissent and doubt were sown. Rafi’s song was the creation of Jaikishan- Hasrat team whereas the Mukesh-song was conceived by Shankar-Shailendra combo. 

 

Shankar had this misunderstanding that his song was purposely put down to promote Jaikishan’s song. For him ‘Dost dost na raha’ was his life’s best composition but it had been pipped to post by his colleague’s tune which he felt was much ‘lightweight’!  Already there were differences brewing in the team over Shankar’s insistence to use Sharada’s vocals at every given opportunity. The friendship of Shankar and Jaikishan began to crumble. ‘Dost dost na raha, pyar pyar na raha’! It was the presence of the two lyricists that still kept the working relationship intact.

 

‘Teesri kasam’: The last hurrah!

 

Meanwhile against the advice of his friends and well-wishers, Shailendra decided to produce a film -‘Teesri kasam.’ The original team of Raj Kapoor, Shankar, Jaikishan, Shailendra and Hasrat was back together. The songs were superbly crafted and executed, reminding of the heydays of the partnership. ‘Duniya banane wale’, ‘Sajanawa bairi ho gaye hamar’, ‘Sajan re jhooth mat bolo’, ‘Aa aa bhi jaa’, ‘Paan khaaye sainya hamaro’, ‘Chalat musafir’ ---Shailendra had written all but one. The one – ‘Maare gaye gulfaam’ was in fact a late addition to accommodate Hasrat. 

 

During the process of film-making, Shailendra found himself shortchanged by many people whom he had considered to be his close confidantes. On top of that the film didn’t do well on its release. He found himself in the eye of an emotional and economic storm. He couldn’t handle that stress. His health suffered a lot in this setback. 

 

On 13th December 1966, he was told to get admitted in hospital. While on the way to hospital, Shailendra and his wife stopped over at Raj Kapoor’s cottage where the showman reminded his friend that he was still to complete the theme song for ‘Mera naam joker’ – which was to be the next ambitious R.K. project. The lyricist jokingly told Raj to finish off his next day’s Tamasha. (Raj’s birthday fell on 14th December.) But that song was never to be completed by the great man. On 14th December 1966, Shailendra left the world for his final journey. The ‘Mera naam Joker’ song ‘Jeena yahan, marna yahan, iske siwa jaana kahan’- left incomplete by Shailendra- was finally completed by his teen-ager son Shaily Shailendra.

 

Adieu:

 

The fabulous four were not four any more. The dream team had disintegrated. 

 

To run smoothly the wagon needed four wheels and the fourth one had fallen! The remaining three members could never really revive the magic of the old and their combined work over next few years was nothing to cheer about. 

 

On 12th September 1971, Jaikishan took his final bow from the stage and left the scene forever. Although Shankar still continued to compose under the ‘Shankar-Jaikishan’ label for many more years, it wasn’t even a patch on the vintage S-J stuff. On 26th April 1987, Shankar also bid us final adieu. 

 

Hasrat gamely carried on the show for more than a decade but even the most famous song by him in that period – Sun saiba sun from ‘Ram teri Ganga maili’ was actually conceived years ago for a S-J composition for the proposed but never completed R.K.–film ‘Ajanta’!  Then finally even he disappeared behind the curtain of time! 

  

 Though today these four great artists are no more with us, their legacy – the superb songs that they made together have become an integral part of every film music lover’s persona. Looking back Shaily Shailendra’s inspired words in ‘Jeena yahan, marna yahan’ make perfect sense in this context. He had said there:

 

‘Kal khel mein hum ho na ho

Gardish mein taare rahenge sada,

Bhoologe tum, bhoolenge woh

Par hum tumhare rahenge sada.’

 

Amen! No one could have said that any better!

 

(*This article first appeared in Vishwas Nerurkar's Shankar Jaikishan anthology.)