Na jaane kya hai dil ka raaz
Posted on: January 19, 2014
This article is written by Sadanand Kamath, a fellow enthusiast of Hindi movie music and a regular contributor to this blog. This article is meant to be posted in atulsongaday.me. If this article appears in sites like lyricstrans.com and ibollywoodsongs.com etc then it is piracy of the copyright content of atulsongaday.me and is a punishable offence under the existing laws.
After ‘Devdas’(1935), the most talked about film of New Theaters-P C Barua combination was ‘Mukti’ (1937). It was a path breaking film. It had a bold story relative to the time period and the new techniques of direction. It is claimed that ‘Mukti’ (1937) is the first film which was extensively shot outdoors in the forest of Gauripur (Assam). It was also the first film in which Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore’s poems were used for the songs in the Bengali version based on his tunes. Incidentally, when the untitled story of the film was narrated to Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore, he gave this movie its title viz. ‘Mukti’.
Since I could not locate the Hindi version of the film on the internet, I watched the Bengali version of the film available in 12 video clips with sub-titles in English. Surprisingly, the video quality is excellent for a 1937 film. I also watched and listened to all the songs of the Hindi version of the film available on the websites so that I could properly relate them to the scenes in the Bengali versions. I am so much impressed by the film that I decided to write a somewhat detailed review of the film.
The film’s story is about a married couple, Prashant (P C Barua) who is an artist and Chitra (Kanan Devi) who is an educated lady and is brought up in the westernised setting of a rich family. Prashant is a recluse and does not like to socialise. He keeps himself fully engrossed in his artistic pursuit and spends much of his time in his studio. Chitra on the other hand is modern and she likes to socialise. Although both love each other, over a period of time Chitra feels neglected by Prashant. Her father Malik (Jagdish Sethi) also does not like his son-in-law’s behaviour as well as his vocation. Adding fuel to already strained relations is Bipul (Bikram Kapoor), the foreign returned Engineer and once a contender along with Prashant for marrying Chitra, who tells her father that Prashant spends much time with a nude model in his studios. Prashant is caught red handed while painting with a semi-nude model. What follows is a showdown between Prashant and Chitra. Both are adamant in their insistense to lead their own life styles. Finally, Chitra asks for ‘mukti’ (freedom) from Prashant who reluctantly agrees after his persuasion fails. He tells Chitra that instead of she leaving him, he would leave the house so that she can stay in his house.
Having been disturbed by the developments, Prashant destroys all his artistic work in a fit of rage . The next day, his car is found on the shore of a river with a note. The police presume that Prashant committed suicide due to his disturbed mind as was evident from his smashed studio and the parked car at the shore of the river. The fact is that Prashant has faked his suicide and he has run away to a deep forest in Assam where he has an submissive elephant as his companion (the elephant in the film was P C Barua’s own pet elephant). He stays with Pahadi (Nawab) and his wife Jharna (Menaka Devi) as a guest. During his stay in the forest, he develops enmity with a local Chief (Dhumi Khan). He comes to know through an old newspaper page that Chitra was to get married to Bipul.
One day, a hunting group visits the forest for hunting wild elephants. Chitra and Bipul are part of the group. During their hunting expedition, they kill Prashant’s pet elephant. But he must keep himself away from the hunting group as in the eyes of both Chitra and Bipul, he is dead. However, when he comes to know that Chitra has been kidnapped by the Chief, he runs for her rescue killing all the associates of the Chief. However, while untying Chitra, the Chief hits Prashant with a dagger prompting him to fire a shot from his revolver which kills the Chief. Chitra is rescued but Prashant collapses on her lap due to a grievous injury. When Chitra asks him as to why he did it, Prashant replies before dying ‘to give you and me a final mukti’ (freedom). With this dialogue, the film ends without much of a melodrama.
The film was quite ahead of its time. The photography by Bimal Roy was exceptional. The opening scene in which Prashant walks through three rooms before knocking the door of the fourth room in complete silence without any background music creates suspense as to what is going to happen next. Actually, it was the director’s way of showing that he had uninterrupted freedom or mukti in passing through three doors of his house, but was stuck at the fourth door of the room which is his studio where Chitra, his wife was changing. The long dialogues were avoided and instead actors’ expressions were used to convey the feelings. Also the melodramatic scenes were captured in subdued manner without dramatising them as often happens in Hindi films of later years.
There were other scenes where one can notice the director’s excellent conceptualisation of the scenes. In the process of destroying all his art works in a fit of rage, he is about to smash the sculpture of Lord Buddha. But the moment he sees Lord Buddha’s eyes, his rage turns into calmness. The second one is the way his ‘suicide’ was conceptualised. A long shot of his car parked at the shore of river is followed by a close up of a Police Officer with a note found in the car. The next frame shows the police officer at the residence of Malik (Chitra’s father) with his one sentence dialogue conveying him the news of Prashant’s suicide. Again the director avoids melodramatic scenes except the close up tears in the eyes in Chitra. There are at least 5 songs of two stanzas which have been used for conveying the feelings of the characters without the use of melodramatic dialogues.
The song which I like the most among songs I watched and listened to from the film is ‘na jaane kya hai dil ka raaz’. To me, it is a gem of a song soulfully rendered by Kanan Devi. The song is written by Arzoo Lucknowi and set to music by Pankaj Mullick. While the audio clip has full song, the video clip starts without the prelude lyrics.
The moment I listened to this song, I felt as if I had heard at least a couple of songs with more or less similar tune in the films released in later years but I am not able to place them. The one I could place is chanda re ja re ja re in which the inspiration for the antara tune appears to come from the antara tune of the song under discussion. But in the broader sense, both these songs are inspired from Rabindra Sangeet.
Listen to this hidden gem from ‘Mukti’ (1937) and note as to how Kanan Devi has rendered this song in her somewhat unusual voice than what we have been normally used to her voice.
Audio
Video
Song-Na jaane kya hai dil ka raaz (Mukti)(1937) Singer-Kanan Devi, Lyrics-Aarzoo Lucknowi, MD-Pankaj Mullick
Lyrics (Based on the audio clip)
kya aa aa
yoon hi
hoti hai ae ae ulfat
kya yoon hi
ee ee ee ee ee
aataa aa hai dil
dekhte hi
unki ee
soorat
mehv ho jaata hai dil
na jaane
kya hai dil ka raaz
na jaane
kya hai dil ka raaz
soz ye hai ya saaz
na jaane kya hai dil ka raaz
na jaane kya hai dil ka raaz
be-dekhe aaraam na aaye
unko paaye khud kho jaaye
be-dekhe aaraam na aaye
unko paaye khud kho jaaye
phir bhi na aaye paas
na jaane
kya hai dil ka raaz
na jaane
kya hai dil ka raaz
koi banaaye koi khijaaye
shauk siwaa ho sharm na aaye
koi banaaye koi khijaaye
shauk siwaa ho sharm na aaye
aur kare khiraaj
na jaane
kya hai dil ka raaz
na jaane
kya hai dil ka raaz
aur koi kyun kar pehchaane
apna bhed wo khud bhi na jaane
aur koi kyun kar pehchaane
apna bhed wo khud bhi na jaane
kaun hai ye andaaz
na jaane
kya hai dil ka raaz
na jaane
kya hai dil ka raaz
4 Responses to "Na jaane kya hai dil ka raaz"
December 17, 2014 at 10:34 pm
Wonderful compilation.
Atulji and Sadanandji deserve GREAT ADMIRATION for their dedication.
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Atul’s Song A Day- A choice collection of Hindi Film & Non-Film Songs 
January 20, 2014 at 3:00 pm
Missing words :
dekhte hi unki soorat
‘ mehv ” ho jaata hai dil
mehv – kho jaana
soz ye hai ya ‘ saaz ‘
aur kare ‘ khiraaj ‘(?)
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