Udaasiyon mein nazar kho gayi
Posted on: March 29, 2013
This article is written by Sadanand Kamath, a fellow enthusiast of Hindi movie music and a regular contributor to this blog.
Majrooh Sulatanpuri’s filmy career as a lyricist started with ‘Shah Jehan’ (1946) under the music direction of Naushad. In the same year, he also wrote lyrics for ‘Keemat’ (1946) for which Naushad was the music director. It was only after the success of ‘Andaz’ (1949) that Majrooh Sultanpuri got his foothold in Hindi film industry. Unfortunately, this success was short lived as he was arrested in 1949 for his anti-establishment poems. He was given an option of either to apologise or face two years of prison. He opted for the later. At the time of his arrest, he was writing lyrics for the film ‘Aarzoo’ (1950) and it was his first collaboration with the music director Anil Biswas. This film also became a hit and all the songs including the iconic song ae dil mujhe aisi jagah le chal became very popular.
After his release from prison, Majrooh Sultanpuri had to restart his filmy career from the scratch. Naushad, having already started his collaboration with Shakeel Badayuni,no longer required him for song writing. It is said that Naushad was very unhappy with him for the events leading to his arrest. His unhappiness can be gauged from the fact that after ‘Andaz’ (1949), Naushad did not work with him until ‘Saathi’ (1968). Raj Kapoor, for whom Majrooh Sultanpuri wrote a song for his first time in ‘Aag’ (1948) under R K Films’ banner, is said to have helped him monetarily during his prison days by giving him an assignment to write a song for his film. [It is said that this was only a ploy to make him accept the monetary assistance which he had refused by saying that he did not want the charity]. Incidentally, the song which he wrote in prison was ik din bik jaayega maati ke mol which Raj Kapoor used in ‘Dharam Karam’ (1976). However, Raj Kapoor also could not help him after his release from the prison as he had already established a successful musical team of Shankar-Jaikishan and Shailendra-Hasrat Jaipuri for his R K Films.
It was during this period that Anil Biswas seems to have helped Majrooh Sultanpuri by giving him the assignment to write lyrics of some of his films like ‘Aakash’ (1953), ‘Fareb’ (1953), ‘Hamdard’ (1953), and ‘Jalianwaala Baagh Ki Jyoti’ (1953). During the same year, he also wrote for Madan Mohan ( ‘Baaghi’, 1953), for Jamal Sen (‘Daaera’, 1953) and for O P Nayyar (‘Baaz’, 1953). Unfortunately, almost all these films failed at the box office. However, some of the songs from these films like hamaare baad ab mehfil mein afsaane bayaan honge, tera haath haath mein aa gayaa, husn bhi hai udaas udaas brought Majrooh Sultanpuri’s credentials as a ghazal writer to the fore. It was the success of ‘Aar Paar’ (1954) that gave Majrooh Sultanpuri his second successful inning in Hindi film industry and the rest is history. He continued to write lyrics for films until his death in May 2000.
Even though Majrooh Sultanpuri collaborated with Anil Biswas with his film ‘Aarzoo’ (1950), it was not until ‘Fareb’ (1953) that he got the opportunity to write the lyrics for all the songs in a movie. The film had 8 songs of which 4 songs have already been discussed in this blog. The film was produced under the banner of Filmina and was directed by Shahid Lateef. Kishore Kumar and Shankutala were in lead roles with Amar, Maya Das, Lalita Pawar, Zohra Sehgal etc in the supporting roles. Some websites have mentioned the name of the lead actress as Shankutala Paranjpye (mother of Sai Pranjpye of ‘Chasm-e-Badoor’ fame). But considering her age profile, I guess Shankutala in this film is the one who was earlier known as Baby Shankutala as a child artist.
I have chosen from this film a rare ghazal ‘ udaasiyon mein nazar kho gayi chale aao’ sung by Sandhya Mukherjee. This song is rarely heard on the radio. Only the audio clips of the songs of this film uploaded on YT are available. Since all other songs by female playback singer is sung by Lata Mangeshkar, my guess is that this could be a background song.
This is a lovely short ghazal expressing longing for the missing loved one.
Song-Udaasiyon mein nazar kho gayi (Fareb)(1953) Singer-Sandhya Mukherji, Lyrics-Majrooh Sultanpuri, MD-Anil Biswas
Lyrics
udaasiyon mein nazar kho gayi
chale aao o
ab intzaar ki hadd ho gayi
chale aao o
udaasiyon mein nazar
gaye ho jab se ae ae ae
huaa hai hazaar baar aisa aa
gaye ho jab se
huaa hai hazaar baar aisa aa
labon tak aa ke hansi kho gayi
chale aao o
ab intzaar ki hadd ho gayi
chale aao o
udaasiyon mein nazar
nahin jo tum
nahin jo tum to bahaar aayi aur udaas gayi ee
nahin jo tum to bahaar aayi aur udaas gayi ee
tumhen na paa ke ghata ro gayi
chale aao o
ab intzaar ki hadd ho gayi
chale aao o
udaasiyon mein nazar
2 Responses to "Udaasiyon mein nazar kho gayi"
March 29, 2013 at 7:56 pm
It’s like a discovering gem!! .
Poet and lyricist Majroohsaab, an unsuccessful hakim, recited one of his ghazals at a mushaira in Sultanpur. The ghazal was an instant hit. He decided there and then to take up writing as a full time profession. Majroohsaab went on to pen songs for more than 300 films
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Atul’s Song A Day- A choice collection of Hindi Film & Non-Film Songs 
March 29, 2013 at 5:01 pm
Kamathji,
Thanks for the interesting piece of information about Majrooh saab. In spite of all these odds of struggles in his initial phase, he was the first lyric writer to awarded with Dada Saheb Palkhe Award in 1993.
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