Pardesi kyun yaad aata hai
Posted on: January 9, 2013
This article is written by Sadanand Kamath, a fellow enthusiast of Hindi movie music and a regular contributor to this blog.
MAN KI JEET (1944) was produced and directed by W Z Ahmed under the banner of Shalimar Pictures owned by him. Shyam and Nina were in the lead roles. The story of the film was said to be based on Thomas Hardy’s novel ‘Tess of the D’urbervilles’. One of the most popular songs from this film nagri meri kab tak yoon hi barbaad rahegi has been discussed in this blog.
I was drawn towards this film mainly because of the mention of the name of Josh Malihabadi as one of the two lyricists for the film, the other lyricist being Bharat Vyas. I was familiar with his name as one of the greatest Urdu poets of 20th century but never knew that he had written lyrics for Hindi films until I got to know from the above-mentioned song. The film’s producer W Z Ahmed was known to employ the best of poets and writers and he used to pay handsomely to retain them under his banner. At one time, Shalimar Pictures boasted of such famous names as Josh Malihabadi, Krishan Chandar, Ramanand Sagar, Akhtar-ul-Iman, Sagar Nizami etc. under their banner.
Once W Z Ahmed heard a song sung by Sitarabai ( in some places her name is mentioned as Tarabai) on AIR Lucknow. Impressed by her voice, he called her to Bombay (Mumbai) for audition and having found her voice suitable for playback singing, he signed her for exclusively singing for the films produced under the banner of Shalimar Pictures. Sitarabai Kanpuri’s first film as a playback singer was ‘Man Ki Jeet’ (1944) in which she sang for lead actor Nina ( real name Shahida) who was W Z Ahmed’s second wife (whom he had married having divorced his first wife). The songs of the film became very popular. Thereafter she gave playback singing only for Nina in Shalimar Pictures’ Prithviraj Samyukta (1946) and Meerabai (1947) until W Z Ahmed and his wife migrated to Pakistan in 1947. After becoming free from the contractual obligations, she gave playback to films of other banners like ‘Pugree’ (1948), ‘Apradhi’ (1949) and ‘Rasheed Dulhan’ (shelved). Thereafter there was no trace of her.
I find on the internet that there exists some confusion between Sitara Devi and Sitarabai Kanpuri with their names as playback singers being freely used interchangeably. For example, a song sung by Sitara Devi in ‘Meri Aankhen’ (1939) has been credited to Sitarabai Kanpuri where as some songs sung by Sitarabai Kanpuri in ‘Pugree’ (1948) have been credited to Sitara Devi. In some places, the confusion has arisen because only the name ‘Sitara’ has been mentioned against the songs. I think that this confusion can be avoided to a great extent if the following points are taken note of while correctly assigning the name of the singer :
1. Sitara Devi was an actor-singer and as far as I know, she sang the song for herself. Sitarabai Kanpuri never acted in any films. She was only a playback singer.
2. Sitarabai Kanpuri started her playback singing career in 1944 with ‘Man ki Jeet’. So one can safely assume that songs attributed to ‘Sitara’ prior to 1944 were sung by Sitara Devi.
3. Between 1944-47, if the songs are credited to ‘Sitara’ and these songs pertained to films produced under the banner of Shalimar Pictures, one can take them to be sung by Sitarabai Kanpuri.
4. If the songs are attributed to ‘Sitara’ for the films in which Sitara Devi was not in the cast, such songs are sung by Sitarabai Kanpuri.
I hope, I am fairly correct with the above 4 points for avoiding confusion between these two singers.
I have chosen a song ‘pardesi kyun yaad aataa hai’ from the film MAN KI JEET (1944) sung by Sitarabai Kanpuri. The song is written by Josh Malihabadi and set to music by S K Pal. Sitarabai Kanpuri’s voice in this song as well as other songs gives me an impression that she was trained in classical music. Being a daughter of a Lucknow courtesan, she may have been exposed to classical music. Another feature of this song is that Josh Malihabadi who was one of the greatest Urdu poets, wrote this song in pure Hindi. I do not remember that Hindi words like ‘ghaneri’ and ‘mandlaatey’ have been used in any other Hindi film songs. The lyrics are simple but convey the hope and despair without being too much melancholic.
Song-Pardesi kyun yaad aata hai (Man Ki Jeet)(1944) Singer-Sitarabai Kanpuri, Lyrics-Josh Malihabadi, MD-S K Pal
Lyrics
pardesi kyun yaad aataa hai
pardesi kyun yaad aataa hai
ik chaand chamak kar jangal mein
chhup chhup kar udhe baadal mein
ik chaand chamak kar jangal mein
chhup chhup kar udhe baadal mein
jab sapnaa saa dikhlaataa hai
jab sapnaa saa dikhlaataa hai
pardesi kyun yaad aataa hai
pardesi
ee ee ee
ee
purab se pawan jab aati hai
jab koyal kook sunaati hai
jab baadal ghir ke aataa hai
pardesi kyun yaad aataa hai
pardesi
ee ee ee
ee
hirday ki ghaneri chhaaon kaa
armaanon kaa aashaaon kaa
armaanon kaa aashaaon kaa
jab ghoonghat pat khul jaataa hai
jab ghoonghat pat khul jaataa hai
pardesi kyun yaad aataa hai
pardesi
ee ee ee
ee
jab beete din yaad aatey hain
baadal ki tarah mandlaatey hain
jab ghaayal dil ghabraataa hai
pardesi kyun yaad aataa hai
pardesi
ee ee ee
ee
8 Responses to "Pardesi kyun yaad aata hai"
January 9, 2013 at 12:19 pm
I too like the four criteria. Even with these, there seem to be some doubts about one Apardhi song ‘pyar karne walon ke’, whether it is by Sitara Kanpuri or shamshad Begum.
LikeLike
January 9, 2013 at 1:43 pm
Apradhi-1949 had music by Sudhir phadke.There were 7 songs.
% songs were sung by Sitara kanpuri and 2 by Durrani.
-AD
LikeLike
January 9, 2013 at 1:13 pm
http://myswar.com/singer/sitara-devi/1
Just stumbled across this web page.
Diverting slightly from the topic, MD SK Pal has some songs in ths blog but no details about him. Also the film ” BEBUS” in which Mukesh has 2 great solos and a duet with Geeta Dutt is yet to feature.
These 3 MUKESH songs from Bebus under SK Pal are gems of the highest cadre. Request someone to post some info about SK Pal and this movie.
LikeLike
January 9, 2013 at 1:40 pm
Mahesh ji,
S.K.Pal or Surya Kumar pal was the nephew of MD Ramchandra Pal.he first got a break in Ek Raat-1942,made by Shalimar pictures of W.Z.Ahmed with Neena(real name Shaheeda).The songs sung by Neena were actually sung by Tara,sister of Sitara Kanpuri.
Pal did prem Sangeet,man ki jeet,Ghulami,bebus,Sagar,maa ,Bebus and pyase nain.
-AD
LikeLike
January 9, 2013 at 2:13 pm
To me,
this haunting voice reminds of Jyuthikaa Roy
LikeLike
January 16, 2013 at 5:39 pm
Sadanand ji,
Thanks for this post. There is so much misinformation created on the internet by very zealous, very impatient, and very extremely poorly informed lovers of music, who do not realize what a post on the internet can amount to. This medium has become such a free for all, that lot of caution is advised, as we gather information from it. Already on this blog we have discussed so many instances of such confusing misinformation.
Arun ji,
As always, your additional inputs are very important :).
Rgds
Sudhir
LikeLike
Atul’s Song A Day- A choice collection of Hindi Film & Non-Film Songs 
January 9, 2013 at 12:10 pm
Kamath ji,
I like the way you have drawn your 4 conclusions.
However I would like to state that Sitara devi-the dancer,actress and singer DID give playback in last few films of her career.She acted in 33 films,but sang in more than 40 films,a total of 150+ songs.
Secondly,W Z Ahmed,the Shalimar supremo was contacted in Pakistan and he has clarified in 2001 that ,Tara Devi was sister of Sitara kanpuri and she sang songs only in the films of MD S.K.Pal.
It is very frustrating that not one but two sitaras had their sisters named as Taras.(Looks like they never thought of the confusions they would cause to us in separating them meticulously ! How cruel !!)
So Tara of Lucknow was sister of Sitara of Kanpur or Sitara Kanpuri.(funny that Lucknow and Kanpur also are very close by in UP).
-AD
LikeLike
January 9, 2013 at 2:27 pm
Oh! confusion galore on Taras 🙂
LikeLike