Ajeeb daastan hai ye
Posted on: October 17, 2023
This article is written by Sadanand Kamath, 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 other sites without the knowledge and consent of the web administrator of atulsongaday.me, then it is piracy of the copyright content of atulsongaday.me and is a punishable offence under the existing laws.
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In 2013, on the occasion of the 100 years of Indian cinema, Dharma Productions and Viacom 18 came out with a film titled ‘Bombay Talkies’ (2013). The film is the collection of four short films – ‘Ajeeb Daastaan Hai Ye’ directed by Karan Johar, ‘Star’ directed by Dipankar Banerjee, ‘Sheila Ki Jawaani’ directed by Zoya Akhtar and ‘Murabba’ directed by Anurag Kashyap. Each short film is of the length of about 30-35 minutes making it a full-length feature film of a little over 2 hours. The film was premiered at the Cannes International Film Festival in May 2013 and has theatrical release in India in June 2013.
‘Ajeeb Daastaan Hai Ye’ is a story of a gay man who is struggling with his sexual orientation. ‘Star’ is a story of a failed actor who has come to Mumbai from his native place. He does some odd jobs to sustain. At last, he gets a small role in a film which is critically appreciated. After the completion of his role and getting artistic pleasure, he leaves for his native place without taking the remuneration for his role. He tells his experience in Bollywood to his sick daughter who enjoys his stories. ‘Sheila Ki Jawaani’ is a story about a minor son who wants to become a Bollywood dancer against the wishes of his father. And the last, ‘Murabba’ is the story of a son who comes to Mumbai to fulfil a strange wish of his father, a fan of Amitabh Bachchan, to give a bottle of homemade murabba to him in his house and bring back half of the quantity of the murabba from that bottle to him. Each of the stories are relatable to Hindi film industry with unconventional endings. These four short films do not belong to the category of usual mainstream Hindi films.
In this article, I am taking up for discussion the first of the short films, ‘Ajeeb Daastaan Hai Ye’ directed by Karan Johar. Rani Mukherjee, Randeep Hooda and Saqib Saleem are the main actors.
It is a story of Avinash (Saqib Saleem) who is haunted by his family for being a gay. He quarrels with his father for not accepting him as gay and leaves home to fend for himself. On the way to the railway station, he listens to an old Hindi film song sung by a small begging girl which is actually a metaphor on his life. He is impressed with her voice but has no money to offer her. He finally gets on a job as intern in a film gossip magazine under the Associate Editor, Gayatri (Rani Mukherjee) whose husband Dev (Randeep Hooda) works in a TV channel as news anchor.
Avinash reveals to Gayatri that he is a gay. But she does not give a shocking reaction as he expected. Both of them exchange some pleasant repartees and they soon become friends. At least, Gayatri finds him to be more joyous and creating a happy mood for her than her husband, Dev who is of a serious type. One day, Gayatri invites Avinash for a dinner where he meets Dev. He finds him to be a bit reserve type of a person. However, both of them have a common interest in listening to old Hindi film songs which makes a common talking point to both of them.
One day, Avinash takes Dev to a railway pedestrian bridge where he makes him to listen to ‘lag jaa gale’ sung by the same small begging girl. He likes her singing and gives her handful of currency notes. Before handing over the money, he asks her as to what she would do with the money. She tells him that she would spend on his brother’s food and clothing. He again asks her whether she is not lying. She retorts back by saying that she does not lie and telling lie is a sin. (This is a metaphor for Dev both in terms of lyrics and of his pretension of not being a gay).
During his limited interaction with Dev, Avinash gets a feeling that he is in love with Dev who is camouflaging his sexual orientation. So, one day, Avinash visits Dev’s office without any intimation and calls him out of his recording room. He says to Dev that he felt like meeting him today. With this, he starts sensually hugging him in front of his office staff. Dev gets angry and assaults him badly. He comes back home badly bruised. After some time, Dev comes to his house and profusely apologises for his behaviour. During this period, both of them kiss each other but soon Dev hits him again and gets out of the house.
The next day, Avinash meets Gayatri in the office and tells her that her husband has kissed him. She does not react as she is in the midst of a meeting with her staff. Instead, she tells them that as usual, he is joking. But in her mind, she gets her answer as to why Dev has been so cold to her to make their marriage an unhappy one. She goes home and while removing her facial make-up, she tells Dev that now she knows that it was not her fault, but it was his problem (of sexual orientation) which kept them apart even in their private moments. (The removal of her make-up is a metaphor for unmasking of Dev’s sexual orientation). She tells Dev that it is all over between them, and she is free from him now.
The film ends with Dev walking over the railway pedestrian bridge where the beggar girl sings for him the second stanza of the song, ‘ajeeb daastaan hai ye’ and asks for money. Dev says he does not have any money. She says he is lying. He repeats her own sentence which she had said few days back to him while accepting money that he does not lie.
After watching this segment of the film, I am pleasantly surprised that Karan Johar who had directed the mainstream films with high doses of melodrama, like ‘Kuchh Kuchh Hota Hai’ (1998), “Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Gham’ (2001), ‘Kabhi Alvida Na Kahna’ (2006) and the likes, has handled a sensitive story very delicately. He has used the Hindi films’ favourite story of a love triangle with a twist. And what an end! Karan Johar made Dev listen to the most apt situational song from the beggar-girl’s soothing voice than listening in his room from a gramophone record. He has been making all his other mainstream films as per the taste of the audience. I guess, Karan Johar made this film as per his liking without worrying about the box office results.
Saqib Saleem has given a fantastic performance in the role of Avinash as a gay character. It is a difficult role because outwardly, he has to show himself as a joyous person while actually, he is very sad within. People get shocked about his sexual orientation which is not of his doing. He has been discarded by his parents. He has no one to share his feelings. Gayatri’s husband, Dev has cheated him. At least, he has not cheated anyone as he is open about his sexual orientation.
I liked the idea of making a capsule of 4 short films of different genre of stories to make it a full-length feature film. I do not think that the makers of the film had box office collections in mind as the film was as a tribute to the Indian cinema for completion of 100 years.
‘Ajeeb Daastaan Hai Ye’ part of the film has no songs. However, two immortal songs from Hindi films of golden period of film music have been partially used as recreated versions. The songs are ‘ajeeb daastaan hai ye’ from ‘Dil Apna Aur Preet Paraayee’ (1960) and ‘lag ja gale’ from ‘Wo Kaun Thhee’ (1964). Apparently, no audio album of the recreated songs was released.
I present the first song which becomes a title song for the short film under discussion. The song is rendered by Rashi Harmalkar who was about 9 years when she rendered this song. The song is picturised on a child beggar who has her usual place on a railway pedestrian bridge to beg for a living. Rashi Harmalkar is a disciple of Suresh Wadkar and she is a trained singer. Obviously, the credit for the lyrics and the music director goes to Shailendra and Shankar-Jaikishan, respectively.
The beggar girl is singing this song on the railway pedestrian bridge when Gayatri (Rani Mukherjee), Dev (Randeep Hooda) and Avinash (Saqib Saleem) are all getting ready and departs for their respective offices. Only Avinash walks over the bridge when he hears the girl singing and goes. The girl repeats the second stanza of the song when Dev and Gayatri have separated and Dev walks over the pedestrian bridge when he hears the song.
I am happy that in the film, the music director, Amit Trivedi has recreated two immortal songs from Hindi films keeping them true to the original tunes with light orchestration to retain the moods of the songs.
Video Clip:
Song-Ajeeb daastaan hai ye (Bombay Talkies)(2013) Singer-Rashi Harmalkar, Lyrics-Shailendra, MD-Shankar Jaikishan
Lyrics
ajeeb daastaan hai ye..
kahaan shuru kahaan khatam
ye manzilen hain kaun si
na wo samajh saken na ham
ajeeb daastaan hai ye
kahaan shuru kahaan khatam
ye manzilen hain kaun si
na wo samajh saken na ham
mubaaraken tumhen ke tum
kisi ke noor ho gaye
mubaaraken tumhen ke tum
kisi ke noor ho gaye
kisi ke itne paas ho
ke sabse door ho gaye…
ajeeb daastaan hai ye
kahaan shuru kahaan khatam
ye manzilen hain kaun si
na wo samajh saken na ham
ajeeb daastaan hai ye..
mubaaraken tumhen ke tum
kisi ke noor ho gaye
mubaaraken tumhen ke tum
kisi ke noor ho gaye
kisi ke itne paas ho..
ke sabse door ho gaye
ajeeb daastaan hai ye..
kahaan shuru kahaan khatam
ye manzilen hain kaun si
na wo samajh saken na ham
ajeeb daastaan hai ye…
5 Responses to "Ajeeb daastan hai ye"
October 17, 2023 at 6:36 pm
I loved the story of the “Murabba”
How the father- Sudhir Pandey (I think) finds out that the gooseberry pickle is not the one that went from his house
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October 17, 2023 at 7:44 pm
Yes. Because the original murabba bottle which his son had shared with Amitabh Bachchan in his house, got broken in the train on his return journey.
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Atul’s Song A Day- A choice collection of Hindi Film & Non-Film Songs 
October 17, 2023 at 5:03 pm
I also liked Ranadeep Hooda`s acting, Thanks Sadanand ji for picking up this not so popular film for your post , full of information about the film, and your insights into the story of the film helped me to understand the story in many other ways, which I have not imagnied while watching the film, Thanks again for that…………
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October 17, 2023 at 7:37 pm
Prakashchandra ji,
I agree, Randeep Hooda has also given a good performance of a character with inner guilty feelings towards his wife, Gayatri (Rani Mukerjee) and towards Avinash (Saqib Saleem).
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