Gumsum kyun hai sanam
Posted on: June 22, 2025
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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Yesterday, I was watching the song, gumsum saa ye jahaan ye raat ye hawaa from the film, ‘Duniya Jhuktee Hai’ (1960). An idea came to me as to how many Hindi films songs may have the word ‘gumsum’ in the first line of the mukhda of the songs. I checked on the internet and found that over two dozen songs had the word, ‘gumsum’ in the first line of the mukhda. There may be more Hindi film songs with ‘gumsum’ but they may appear elsewhere in the songs. I selected few such songs to watch/listen. One of ‘gumsum’ songs which I heard for the first time and liked so much that I must have heard umpteen times. It is a beautifully crafted song in terms of lyrics, rendition, orchestration and the picturisation. The song is ‘gumsum kyun hai sanam o zaraa maan jaa’ from the film, ‘Bhala Maanush’ (1979) which I am presenting in this short write-up, concentrating mainly on the song. Gulshan Bawra wrote this song.
The genesis of this song was that one of the songs of an EP album of Bengali non-film songs composed by R D Burman which was released at the time of 1977 Pooja festival contained ‘jhoom jhoom raat nijhoom’ rendered by Asha Bhosle. This song’s duration was little over 3 minutes. R D Burman decided to use the tune of this Bengali non-film song in a Hindi film, ‘Kasme Vaade’ (1978) for one of its songs which is under discussion. However, this song did not get picturised because there was no proper context in the screenplay. But the song found place in the audio album of the film (LP – Polydoor-2392 144).
R D Burman re-used the same song in its totality for the film, ‘Bhala Maanush’ (1979). The song is picturised on Neetu Kapoor and Randhir Kapoor, her then future brother-in-law. Incidentally, Randhir Kapoor and Neetu Singh also worked as pair in ‘Kasme Vaade’ (1978) and most probably, the song may have been meant to be picturised on them. The credit titles of ‘Bhala Maanush’ (1979) mention that the song under discussion is courtesy Rose Movies, the film production banner of Ramesh Behl who produced ‘Kasme Vaade’ (1978).
This song from ‘Kasme Vaade’ (1978) fitted in ‘Bhalaa Maanush’ (1979) in its context. Anand (Randhir Kapoor), a simpleton from a village has migrated to Mumbai to get some job after leaving his mother in the village. He gets a job in an export-import business owned by Vikram (Om Shivpuri), the front company for his smuggling business. When Anand goes back to his native place to bring his mother (Sulochana) to stay with him in Mumbai, he finds her seriously ill. At that time, she reveals him that she is not his real mother but Chand Usmani who died during his infancy, and his father, Surendranath (Om Shivpuri) abandoned him when he was an infant. So, Anand is in a sombre mood after he returns to Mumbai. At that time, Reena (Neetu Singh), without knowing the reasons behind Anand’s sombre mood, tries to elevate his mood by romantically wooing him by this song with some flashback of their romance. The song ends abruptly as Randhir Kapoor places his hand on her mouth.
Even though I am an admirer of the golden period of Hindi film music (mainly from second half of 1940s through 1960s), I have a great fascination for the some of the songs composed by R D Burman whom I consider as a phenomenon in Hindi film music – a trend setter music director in the same way as was Rajesh Khanna who was called a phenomenon star actor in the 1970s.
The ingenuity of R D Burman as a music director can be judged by his composition of the song under discussion. He used the tune of his Bengali non-film song referred to above as a ‘raw material’ for the Hindi song under discussion and improvised it with an elaborate interlude music to extend it to nearly 5 minutes of duration. The interlude orchestration mainly include the use of saxophone (probably played by Manohari Singh), special type of percussions (probably played by Cawas Lord) and guitar notes.
I recommend listening to this song minutely on the audio clip which is more elaborate than the video clip. The listeners will realise the uniqueness of this song in terms Asha Bhosle’s rendition and unusual orchestrations. Asha Bhosle sings mukhda on a higher octave and slides to antara in a lower octave. If I use the Hindustani classical terminology, Asha Bhosle also uses ‘harkat’ in her singing at few places, probably her own improvisations, to lend a bit of fun element to lighten the mood. One example is when she sings with ‘harkat’ the line ‘ o zaraa maan jaa’. It is also an rare instance in the song that Asha Bhosle’s vocals follow the preceding saxophone note as a continuation when she sings the line, ‘dard de diyaa to de de dawaa’. Perhaps, it may be Manohari Singh’s addition.
Incidentally, this song is also unique in that while the video clip of the song is in ‘Bhalaa Maanush’ (1979) the audio clip of the song appears only in the LP of ‘Kasme Vaade’ (1978). The reason is that the gramophone record releasing companies are different for these two films. Hence, this song needs to be tagged under both the films in our Blog.
Video Clip:
Audio Clip:
Song-Gumsum kyun hai sanam(Kasme Vaade)(1978)/ Bhala Maanush (1979) Singer-Asha Bhonsle, Lyrics- Gulshan Baawra, MD-R D Burman
Lyrics (Based on Audio Clip):
ho o
naa
haan
naa
ho o
gumsum kyun hai sanam
ab zaraa maan jaa
pyaar kaa ye mausam hai
aise mein dil naa jalaa aa aa
gumsum kyun hai sanam
ab zaraa maan jaa
pyaar kaa ye mausam hai
aise mein dil naa jalaa aa aa
gumsum kyun hai sanam
gumsum kyun hai sanam
jaane boojhe nazar churaaye
dil kee baaten samajh naa paaye
o sitamgar dekh ab to
ho jaa meharbaan aan aan
jaane boojhe nazar churaaye
dil kee baate samajh naa paaye
o sitamgar dekh ab to
ho jaa meharbaan
dard diyaa to de de dawaa aa
gumsum kyun hai sanam
ab zaraa maan jaa
pyaar kaa ye mausam hai
aise mein dil naa jalaa aa aa
gumsum kyun hai sanam
ab zaraa maan jaa
pyaar kaa ye mausam hai
aise mein dil naa jalaa aa aa
gumsum kyun hai sanam
gumsum kyun hai sanam
kabse hai bekaraar ye dil
kabse kehtee hoon jhoom ke mil
o anaaree ban khilaadee
lele baahon mein en en
kabse hai bekaraar ye dil
kabse kehtee hoon jhoomke mil
o anaaree ban khilaadee
lele baahon mein
kaise piyaa se meraa paalaa padaa aa aa
gumsum kyun hai sanam
ab zaraa maan jaa
pyaar kaa ye mausam hai
aise mein dil naa jalaa aa aa
gumsum kyun hai sanam
ab zaraa maan jaa
pyaar kaa ye mausam hai
aise mein dil naa jalaa aa aa
gumsum kyun hai sanam
gumsum kyun hai sanam
bolo na
la la la la la la la
la la la la la la la
8 Responses to "Gumsum kyun hai sanam"
June 22, 2025 at 9:12 am
Beautiful song. Very softly sung by AB. Thank you for sharing this post!!
June 22, 2025 at 11:24 am
Good Morning,
This song is not that worth to be covered under Atul’s Song A Day,
Apologies
Uma🙏
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June 22, 2025 at 11:48 am
Sir, Each and every song from Hindi Films do deserve a place on this blog. Some more some less. So let’s not be dismissive. A lot of time and effort has gone in to making the songs, by many artists.
June 26, 2025 at 7:14 pm
Marathi version of the song used in Marathi film, ‘Sukhi Sansarachi 12 Sutre (1995).
Sadanand Kamath
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July 2, 2025 at 11:33 am
Thanks for this post Sir jee with this lovely song. I like your mentioning Pancham as ‘phenomenon’. Enjoyed the song once again (have listened to it umpteen times) and also enjoyed the Marathi song. Thanks for enlightening us about the improvisations in this musical creation (like the orchestration, instruments, singing etc etc).
Thanks a lot again,
Regards,
Avinash
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Atul’s Song A Day- A choice collection of Hindi Film & Non-Film Songs 
June 22, 2025 at 8:52 am
A song from my growing up years that I loved. I hadn’t seen Kasme Vaade when it had released, saw it only sometime in the last 10-20 years. Similarly, I saw Bhala Manus only in recent years.
I had the audio cassette of Kasme Vaade & had heard this song in it and was surprised not to find it in the film. Then when I saw Bhala Manus I found the song. My father had told me then, that possibly there was no place for the song in one film so it was used in the other.
thank you for giving the background regarding this song
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June 22, 2025 at 12:12 pm
Thanks Peevesie’s Mom.
Your father’s premotion about the exclusion of this song from ‘Kasme Vaade’ (1978) turned out to be correct.
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