Kyaa jaane man kya kehtaa hai
Posted on: January 7, 2025
This article is written by Arunkumar Deshmukh, 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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Today’s song is from a Historical film Prithviraj-Sanyukta-1946.
The film was directed by Najam Naqvi and the music was by S.K.Pal. There were 3 Lyricists – Josh Malihabadi (4 songs), Akhtar Ul Iman (4 songs) and Pt. Bharat Vyas (1 song). The cast was Prithviraj Kapoor ( what a coincidence. Filmi Prithviraj enacted the historical Prithviraj !), Neena, Tiwari, Bharat Vyas (his first screen appearance), S.K.Prem, Uma Dutt and others.
Hindi film industry has been making films with historical stories from the early era of filmmaking. The first Historical Silent film was in 1925, made on Amar Singh Rathod. The first Historical Talkie film was Noorjehan-1931 made by Imperial in Bombay. In the first few years of Talkie films, the focus of the filmmakers was on Mythological, Love stories and Historical stories. After making films on folklore and traditional love stories from various countries, the filmmakers dug out love stories from different states and regions of India and made films on them.
Here are names of some films made on love stories…..
Romeo and Juliet-1947 (Italian story), Laila majnu-7 films from 1931 to 1984 (Arabia), Shirin Farhad-1931, 1945 and 1956 (Persia).
Films were also made on love couples like Uttara-Abhimanyu, Subhadra-Arjun, Usha-Anirudha, Dhola- Maru, Jodha-Akbar, Salim-Anarkali, Bajirao-Mastani, Prithviraj – Sanyogita, Amrapali-Bimbisara,, Mumal-Mahendra, Amaravathi- Ambikapathy, Wamiq-Azra and many others. These are only a few examples. A film on Prithviraj-Sanyogita was also made in 1933. Navinchandra and Padma Devi were the lead actors. The correct name was Sanyogita, but the 1946 film made the film as Sanyukta. The reasons are unknown. The famous love story with its background was….
Prithviraj Chauhan ( 1149-1192) was the king of the Chauhan dynasty whose rule extended to parts of present day Rajasthan, Haryana, Delhi and some parts of Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh. He is also hailed as the last Rajput king to rule Delhi before the Muslim conquest of the Indian subcontinent. Prithviraj was a valiant king and his glory surged to new heights after he defeated Muhammad Ghori, the Sultan of Ghurid Empire (present day Afghanistan) in the first battle of Tarain. Legend has it that Ghori attacked Delhi 17 times, and was defeated 16 times at the hands of Prithviraj Chauhan and his army.
Soon enough, the heroic tales of Prithviraj’s valour reached the ears of Sanyogita, the daughter of Kannauj king, Jayachand. But before love could flourish between the two, the relationship between Jayachand and Prithviraj Chauhan was strained. Jayachand wanted to assert his supremacy over the other Rajput kings and hence decided to do a Rajsuya Yagya. Prithviraj, however, refused to accept Jayachand’s supremacy and this marked the beginning of their enmity. But while Jayachand was enraged by Prithiviraj’s refusal to accept him as the supreme king, his daughter Sanyogita was smitten. She had heard about Chauhan’s heroic expeditions and was absolutely in love with him.
According to legend, they fell in love when a painter from Prithviraj’s court, Panna Ray, visited Kannauj and showed his painting of the king to the princess. The same painter, upon returning, painted Sanyogita’s portrait and showed it to Prithviraj. Needless to say, he too was smitten by her beauty.
At this time, Jayachand decided to arrange a swayamvara for his daughter. He sent an invite to all the kings except Prithiviraj. To add to the insult, he got a statue of Prithviraj made and installed it as a doorman. But Sanyogita had already given her heart to him. When she came to know that he wasn’t even invited to the swayamvara, she was devastated and wrote him a letter expressing her desire to marry him. To this, Prithviraj promised her that he would come to the swayamvara.
On the day of the swayamvara, Sanyogita walked past all the kings and princes, rejecting each one of them, and finally reaching the statue. At that moment, Chauhan, who was hiding until then, came out and Sanyogita put the garland around his neck. Prithviraj Chauhan then openly challenged Jayachand to stop him from taking his wife. This made Jayachand shake with rage at the insult in front of a huge gathering of kings and princes.
That day, thousands of soldiers laid their lives to make sure that Prithviraj Chauhan escaped safely from Kannauj, with his newly-wedded wife Sanyogita.
Jayachand was raging with anger and he wanted to take revenge. So, he formed an alliance with Muhammad Ghori, whom Prithviraj had previously defeated 16 times, and extended his support to Ghori’s army to attack Delhi. When Ghori’s army attacked this time, Prithiviraj lost the war and Ghori captured him. Legend has it that Chauhan had begun to ignore state affairs after his marriage to Sanyogita.
Chauhan was defeated, but he refused to bow his head in front of the Sultan. So, Ghori’s soldiers blinded him, using hot iron rods. Seeing his king helpless and in pain, Bardai – the court poet – who had been accompanying Prithviraj in the war, tricked the Sultan into organising an archery performance by Prithviraj Chauhan. Apparently, Prithviraj could hit a target with just his sense of sound.
An archery competition was held and Bardai subtly told his blind king about the exact place where the Sultan was standing. He said:(Translation: Sultan is sitting four measures ahead of you and twenty four yards away when measured with eight fingers. Don’t miss your target, Chauhan).
When Muhammad Ghori ordered the blind king to shoot, Prithviraj took aim based on Bardai’s hints and shot the arrow at him. He didn’t miss his target and Muhammad Ghori was killed. The court-poet then stabbed Prithviraj and himself to avoid further humiliation at the hands of Ghori’s soldiers. (Thanks to whoopscoop).
1946 was an important year in the history of Hindi films. This was the period when the impending Independence of India was on the Anvil and everyone knew that in the year 1947 it would take place. At the same time when the country was to be divided on the basis of Religion and another muslim country Pakistan was to come into existence. Many of the muslims in the film industry were excitedly awaiting their departure from India to the Utopia. This would, naturally, create a lot of vacancies in every department of film making. However, there was enough talent available in the remaining India to fill up the void. Hence from the year 1946 itself there were several debutantes. This made the year 1946 an year of Debuts of several new actors, directors, MDs, Lyricists etc etc.
The second World War had just ended, which had created inumerable millionaires, fed on black marketing and illegal trades in the war period. Many of them were keen on investing their ill gotten wealth in the film industry. Thus, there was no dearth of finances in the industry. From 1946 to around the early years of the 50’s, some of these ” novo-rich” persons provided finance. Some even tried their hand at directing films or even acting in it. Let us see what other things happened during this period.
By 1946 to 1950 old towers shook hard to crumble. The studio system almost disappeared. Film industry could now boast of people highly educated, talented and hard working. Even artists with International experience and success like Dewan Sharar, Shakuntala Paranjpye, actor Ranjan, Balraj Sahni etc contributed to Indian films. The old horse of Calcutta-New Theatres broke down and actors, directors and Music specialists from Bengal made a Bee-Line to Bombay, thus making it the strongest ever film centre.
1946 was also an year of consolidation, in a sense that due to the iminent Partition of India on the basis of Religion, agreed upon by Gandhi-Nehru combine, made Muslim artistes and filmmakers plan to pack their bags and move over to the new Utopia across the border. Their vacancies were to be filled up by the waiting second line of actors,directors and MDs. The film industry was to have a complete new look within 1-2 years and the beginning was from 1946. Thus the year was very important.
The year 1946 was a year which saw many changes in the film industry. The II world war had just ended. Rationing and control on many items had created Black marketing. This made many people Millionaires. The extra income started getting invested in Film making. The increased cost of Raw Films made filmmaking 7 to 8 times costlier. A film which was made in about 1 Lakh rupees in 1940, needed 8 Lakhs now. Studio system was waning and artiste rates increased in Lakhs instead of thousands.
In 1945, only 74 films were made. This number increased to 153 films in 1946. Further, in 1947, the film industry produced a record number of films – 181, but of course that was due to Partition. The quality of films was sacrificed at the cost of the quantity of films made in 1946. However, some quality films were made in 1946, indicating the changing face of filmmaking.
Film Dharti ke Lal-46 was made by IPTA people and it became the first film to be exhibited in Russia. Neecha Nagar-46 won the Grand Prix award in the French Film Festival. Film Dr. Kotnis ki amar kahani-46 was dubbed in English as ‘ The journey of Dr. Kotnis’. It was shown in the USA and then in the Venice Film Festival. Two musical films- Anmol Ghadi and Shahjahan were made in 1946.
Year 1946 also saw the Debut of several stars and artists. In fact one can call 1946 as the ” Debut year” of the Hindi film industry. See this….
Nirupa Roy debuted in film Amar Raaj-46
Nasreen (real name Zareena), daughter of Rafiq Gaznavi and Anwari bai had debuted in her first released film ” Shahjahan“-1946.
Geeta Bali debuted with a dance in film Badnami-46
Geeta Roy sang her first film song in film Bhakta Prahlad-46
Balraj Sahni debuted in the film Insaaf-46. It was a small role,though.
K A Abbas-Director, Pt.Ravi Shankar-MD, Balraj Sahni as Hero and Damayanti Sahni as Heroine made their Debut in film Dharti Ke Lal-46
Meena Kapoor sang her first released Hindi film song in the film Eight Days-46. She also recorded her first Hindi film song in the film ‘Door Chalen’-1946, which was released later than the film Eight Days-46.
Sudhir Phadke debuted as MD in film Gokul-46
P L Santoshi as Director, Dev Anand, Rehman, Rehana and Kamla Kotnis debuted as actors in film Hum Ek Hain-46
Chitragupta did his first film as MD in Lady Robin Hood-46
Ram Ganguly became MD with film Maharana Pratap-46
Abhi Bhattacharya debuted in Hindi film Milan-46
Chetan Anand as Director, Uma Anand and Kamini Kaushal as actresses debuted in film Neecha Nagar-46
Hansraj Behl debuted as MD with film Pujari-46
Madhubala(as Baby Mumtaz) sang her first song in film Pujari-46
Majrooh Sultanpuri wrote his first Hindi film song in film Shahjahan-46
S D Burman as MD and Kishore Kumar as an actor debuted with film Shikari-46
So, you will find the year 1946 was truly a year of change. The winds of Partition were already blowing and the second line of supplementary artistes was ready to replace the Migrators, after the Partition.
Prithviraj Kapoor was the head of the Kapoor clan, from where actors came from each subsequent generation after him. A little known fact is that the father of Prithviraj Kapoor- shri Basheshwar Nath Kapoor had also acted in the film ” Awara“-1951, doing a small role ! So the Kapoors have a long connection with films ! Prithviraj Kapoor had acted in 7 Silent films and 92 Talkie films, in addition to a noteworthy contribution to stage dramas through his own Prithvi Theatres. Hats off to his achievements. His films were between 1930 to 1969. Highly credible indeed.
Now let us enjoy the 79 year old song from this film, sung by Sitara Kanpuri.
HFGK mentions Neena (the lead actress) as the singer of this song, but it is to be emphasized that Neena was not a singer. All her songs were sung by Sitara Kanpuri.
Neena’s husband W.Z.Ahmed himself had clarified it.
Here are the relevant excerpts:
“Waheeduddin Ziauddin Ahmed, the smart brain behind showing tempting dreams to a housewife and making her an actress in 5 films, died in a hospital in Lahore, after a prolonged illness, on 15-4-2007. It was/is believed by some even now that Neena sang her own songs initially. However, during one of his visits to India, Ahmed made it very clear that ALL songs including those attributed to Neena were sung by Sitara Kanpuri only. ”
This is recorded in Listener’s Bulletin no.134 of July 2007. So, there should be no doubt whatsoever about this.
Song- Kya jaane mann kya kehta hai (Prithviraj Sanyukta)(1946) Singer- Sitara Kanpuri, Lyricist- Josh Malihabadi, MD- S.K.Pal
Lyrics
kya jaane mann kya kehta hai
kya kehta hai
kya jaane
kya jaane mann kya kehta hai
kya kehta hai kya jaane
jab ?? ke gaanon ko
jab koyaliya kee taanon ko
jab ?? ke gaanon ko
jab koyaliya kee taanon ko
jee sehte sehte sehta hai
jee sehte sehte sehta hai
kya jaane
kya jaane mann kya kehta hai
kya kehta hai
kya jaane
kya jaane mann ky kehta hai
kya kehta hai kya jaane
jab ban mein panchhee gaate hain
jab ban mein panchhee gaate hain
jab rain sandesa laate hain
jab rain sandesa laate hain
jab paanee thham thham behta hai
jab paanee ee
jab paanee thham thham behta hai
kyaa jaane
kya jaane mann kya kehta hai
kya kehta hai
kya jaane
kya jaane mann kya kehta hai
kya kehta hai
kya jaane
jab raaton ke aandhiyaare mein
andhiyaare ke ujiyaare mein
jab raaton ke aandhiyaare mein
andhiyaare ke ujiyaare mein
har taara chup chup rehta hai
har taara chup chup rehta hai
kya jaane
kya jaane mann kya kehta hai
kya kehta hai
kya jaane
kya jaane mann kya kehta hai
kya kehta hai
kyaa jaane
Atul’s Song A Day- A choice collection of Hindi Film & Non-Film Songs 
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