Mil na saka dil ko agar pyaar tumhaara
Posted on: August 27, 2014
This article is written by Mahesh Mamadapur, a fellow enthusiast of Hindi movie music and a 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.
Legendary singer Mukesh was born in Delhi, on July 22, 1923 in a middle class family consisting of 10 children. Mukesh was the sixth of the siblings. The lure of films always appealed to Mukesh and as such he was less interested in studies. After his matriculation in a municipal school he was able to get a job of assistant surveyor in Delhi’s department of public works through his father. However, after just seven months of service, Mukesh ran away to Mumbai to become another KL Saigal whose adherent fan he had been all along. Even in school, Mukesh was known as “junior saigal” and the lunch breaks often involved the young Mukesh rendering his favourite Saigal numbers to his peers amongst whom Roshan Lal would be one on the harmonium.
Before landing in Mumbai, Mukesh had secretly recorded 6 private songs in Delhi in 1940. In Mumbai, his relative, a well-known actor at that time, Motilal, arranged for his stay. Motilal was already impressed with the young man’s voice, when he had heard him sing at his elder sister’s wedding. Motilal even engaged Pandit Jagannath Prasad to train the young singer.
The film career of Mukesh began with the film Nirdosh (1940) in he which he acted opposite Nalini Jaywant. Naturally, he singing also started with this film in which he had one ghazal penned by Neelkanth Tiwari and 2 duets with Nalini Jaywant. The music director of the film was Ashok Ghosh.
From 1940-45, Mukesh experimented himself with a variety of roles, but without much success. In 1945, with Pheli Nazar, he appeared on the center-stage by giving playback for the unforgettable “dil jalta hai tho jalne do” aptly for Motilal himself. In this song, Mukesh heavily copied his idol Saigal. Bets were placed all over the country as to who the actual singer was and to the extent that Saigal himself is said to have commented “but I don’t remember singing this song”. This all-time great song was composed by Anil Biswas who along with Naushad was instrumental in shaping the singing career of Mukesh in his early years.
The phenomenal success of the song once again started a burning desire by Mukesh to follow the footsteps of saigal in becoming an “actor-singer” a disastrous decision which almost cost Mukesh his career. Today, many know Mukesh only as a great singer. Sudhir ji in his “The Voice of Mukesh” series has amply covered many songs of the 40’s. The series also covers with detailed explanations of most of the films in which Mukesh took up other roles. The table below enlists the other roles Mukesh donned before he took up only playback singing seriously.
| Year | Film | Role | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1940 | – | – | Recorded 6 private songs |
| 1941 | Nirdosh | Actor-Singer | With Nalini Jaywant |
| 1942 | Adaab Arz | Actor | With Nalini Jaywant |
| 1942 | Dukh-Sukh | Actor-Singer | With kathak dancer Sitara Devi |
| 1944 | Uss-paar | Villan | With Kusum and has one duet in the film |
| 1949 | Rumaal | Guest appearance | – |
| 1951 | Malhar | Producer | With Roshan as Music Director |
| 1953 | Aah | Guest appearance | Featuring in the song “choti si yeh zindagani” as a tangewala |
| 1953 | Mashooqa | Actor-Singer | With Suraiya |
| 1956 | Anuraag | Actor, Singer, Music Director and Producer | With Usha Kiran |
The making of Mashooqa proved to be very ruinous for Mukesh as he had signed a contract that he would not be singing for any other production house or actor. Music directors in particular started avoiding Mukesh and to make matters worse, the release of the film got delayed. Anuraag with manifold roles by Mukesh also boomeranged at the box-office.
It was only with the great support from Shanker Jaikishan and Salil Choudhary for Yahudi and Madhumati respectively, that things started looking brighter for Mukesh from 1958. There was no looking back and the following year in 1959, Mukesh went on to become the first ever male singer to win the filmfare award for Best Playback singer for Anari. He received this award from his fan and president of Egypt Al Nasir.
Mukesh received 4 filmfare awards, 1 National Award in 1974 and 3 Bengal Film Journalists Association Awards apart from others.
Starting from 1940 to 1976, in a career spanning 36 years, Mukesh sang less than a thousand hindi film songs. The figure could reach about 1100 or so if we include all his regional and non-film songs, ghazals etc. Mukesh was one of the few singers whose non film songs were as popular as his filmi songs.
Remembering this great singer on his 38th death anniversary (27th August 1976), I bring to the music lovers a very famous NFS. The lyrics are penned by Indivar and the music is scored by Kishore Desai
Audio
Song-Mil na saka dil ko agar pyaar tumhaara (Mukesh NFS)(1970) Singer-Mukesh, Lyrics-Indeewar, MD-Kishore Desai
Lyrics
mil naa sakaa dil ko
mil naa sakaa dil ko
agar pyaar tumhaara
aana padega mujhko duniya mein dubaara
mil naa sakaa dil ko
gaal par gulaab ke shabnam hai zindagi
pyaar ke liye to bahut kam hai zindagi
udti hui is umr ko ek teraa sahaara
aana padega mujhko duniya mein dubaara
mil naa sakaa dil ko
apni ye chhoti si mulaaqaat bahut hai
jitni der tera miley saath bahut hai
bas ek jhalak ek nazar ek ishaara
aana padega mujhko duniya mein dubaara
mil naa sakaa dil ko
agar pyaar tumhaara
aana padega mujhko duniyaa mein dubaara
aana padega mujhko duniyaa mein dubaara
aana padega mujhko
8 Responses to "Mil na saka dil ko agar pyaar tumhaara"
August 27, 2014 at 9:04 am
My fav NFS of Mukesh. Love singing it anytime. Thanks Maheshji.
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August 27, 2014 at 9:15 am
mil naa saka geet to
agar mujhko tumhaara
aana padega tujhko
duniya mein dubaara
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August 27, 2014 at 11:17 am
Oh! This is fantastic! Many thanks for this nice post.A great way to remember Mukesh! What does it matter if he did not sing thousands of songs? As the poet said. ” It is not growing like a tree, in bulk, doth make man better be; in small proportions we may just beauties see.”
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August 27, 2014 at 11:42 am
Or do not miss the woods for the trees. thode jhaad kam hone per bhi jungle jungle hi rehta hai
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August 27, 2014 at 12:39 pm
Thank you Maheshji for remembering and paying tribute to Mukesh on his death anniversary. This is the first time I heard this NFS of his.
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August 29, 2014 at 8:57 am
Thank you Mahesh ji for a beautiful write-up on this wonderful singer, who is perhaps a rare artist to be honoured by the Government to have been featured on a postage stamp! But this was indeed a rare tribute in which the name of Raj Kapoor was not mentioned even once! Mukesh sang most songs for Raj Kapoor. It would be an interesting study to see if Raj Kapoor sang more songs in other singers’ voices or Mukesh sang more songs for other actors!
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August 29, 2014 at 1:05 pm
Vijay ji
Many Thanks for appreciating the article. Your question is in fact interesting and tricky.
Mukesh sang about 120 songs for Raj Kapoor, 48 for Manoj Kumar and about 20 for Dilip saab. If we include all other actors, the figure will definitely be much more than 120.
Many singers like Mannada,Talat and Rafi saab, Kishoreda etc sang for Raj Kapoor.I don’t have a figure, but my wild guess is that, this number may not exceed 40. I think AK ji’s blog had an article on this subject.
I also thank all others for the comments.
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Atul’s Song A Day- A choice collection of Hindi Film & Non-Film Songs 
August 27, 2014 at 7:30 am
Our Tributes to the great Mukesh ji on his death anniversary.
Mahesh ji, many thanks for the post and this song which I had not heard so far.
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