Umangon ke din beete jaayen
Posted on: November 30, 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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6344 | Post No. : | 19655 |
Today’s song is from a musical film – Sunehre Din-1949. The film was directed by Satish Nigam and the wonderful music came from the veteran Gyan Dutt. Lyrics were by D.N.Madhok, Shevan Rizvi and Shekhar, M.A. The cast included Rehana, Raj Kapoor, Nigar Sultana, Ramesh Sinha, Heera Sawant and others. Here is some information on the less known and the least discussed actress cum dancer Heera Sawant.
Sawant (15 December 1935 – 09 October 2023) was an actress and dancer in Hindi and Marathi films. She was known for films like Mughal-E-Azam, Naya Daur, Return Of Mr. Superman, Kala Pani and Solwa Saal.
Heera Sawant was born on 15 December 1935 in a small village Azagaon in Sawantwadi State, undivided India, now in Maharashtra. Her father had the business of Lathe Motor Parts. He has four sons and two daughters, Heera was the eldest one. Heera came to Bombay with her mother and lived in the Opera House area. She did matriculation from Santa Teresa High School, Girgaon. Sanju Shetty, brother of Famous actor Sapru’s wife Hemawati was residing next to her house. With the help of both sister & brother, Heera got the opportunity to work in Prithvi Theater. She learnt Kathak from Master Mohanlal.
Heera Sawant was a stage actress before she joined films. Extremely fond of acting, she gave up school to join Prithvi Theatres and danced her way through those stage hits, “Deewar”, “Pathan” & “Shakuntala”, before film contracts came her way. Her first film was “Hua Savera” which was followed by many films including “Kafila,” “Rangeela” and the Marathi film “Soneri Savli”. Slim, attractive and vivacious, Heeera was an excellent dancer, well-versed in Kathak and Bharat Natyam.
Heera Sawant was an actress, known for Return of Mr. Superman (1960), Kala Pani (1958) and Solva Saal (1958), Lutera Aur Jadugar (1968), Tatar Ki Hasina (1968), Tu Hi Meri Zindagi (1965), Flying Man (1965), Khuni Khazana (1965), Kala Ghoda (1963), Flying Horse (1963), Mr. Toofan (1963), Holiday In Bombay (1963), Madam Zapatta (1962) & many more.
Between 1940s – 1960s was the time when dancers were necessary ingredients of many Hindu/Urdu films. Cuckoo and Helen were the most famous ones, but there were many second-tier dances active during the same time period Sheila Vaaz, Meenakshi, Kum Kum, Kammo in the 1950s later joined by Bela Bose, Madhumati, Lakshmi Chhaya etc in the 1960s. Heera Sawant was one of these second-tier dancers busy in Hindi films from late 1940s to late 1960s. Famous films as dancer include Sunehre Din (1949), Meenar (1954), Musafir (1957), and Kala Pani (1958). She also made guest appearances with Vijaya Chaudhary, Minoo Mumtaz in famous qawwali from Mughal-e-Azam (1960) – Teri mehfil mein kismat aazma kar hum bhi dekhenge…
Heera Sawant married in 1970 to a businessman Sundar Arya. They have two daughters Natasha and Rupali. Heera Sawant was residing in Prabhadevi area near Mahalaxmi Temple.
Veteran yesteryears’ actress of Hindi and Marathi films, Heera Sawant breathed her last on 9th October 2023 in Bombay. She passed away peacefully.(thanks to S.Sarvaiya ji).
Today’s film was made in 1949. There are various opinions about the beginning of ” The Golden Era” of Hindi films. Some say from 1950 and few knowledgeables claim 1949 was the beginning. Here are my own views on 1949……What an year 1949 was ! It not only gave superlative quality musical films but also was an eventful year for the industry setting Benchmarks for various activities. Aptly,1949 can be called a “True First year of the ‘GOLDEN ERA’ ” of Hindi film music.
Andaz and Barsat were the 2 films which set standards for such films in the future. Andaz was Mehboob’s 3 rd film after Anmol Ghadi-46 and Anokhi Ada-48 where films were based on Love triangles. The only film of Raj and Dilip together,Andaz had songs which create the same magic even today..
Barsat established RK Banner,gave it a Monogram (DP in today’s Lingo) in the pose by Raj and Nargis from the film,and launched several artistes for a successful career like, Shankar-jaikishen,Shailendra,hasrat jaipuri,Ramanand Sagar and Nimmi for whom all this was a debut film. Andaz gave introduction to Platonic love and Barsat gave prestige to Love stories in films.
Mahal-First film of Kamaal Amrohi as a Director,established Madhubala as a Star, started a trend for Mystery based films and made Lata an All India Phenomenon !
In 1949, South and East productions also contributed substantially. After the stunning success of Chandralekha, S S Vasan of Gemini Films, Madras brought his second Blockbuster in Hindi,Telugu and Tamil ( Chandralekha was made in Hindi,Tamil,Telugu and Simhali,all 4 were superhits). NISHAN-49 had Ranjan and P. Bhanumathy in the lead,even in Hindi edition. Ranjan (Ramanarayana Venkataramana Sarma) a multi-talented, internationally known artiste was a popular Hero. Vasan used him in his 3 rd Hindi/Tamil/Telugu film ‘Mangala-50’.
From Calcutta came Shanta Apte’s ‘Swayamsidha’-49- a story of a strong woman. Many films were made on this story almost every decade later on. Chhota Bhai-also from Calcutta in the same year represented India in a Canada Film Festival.
Ek thi Ladki-49 made “Lara Lappa” a National song. Meena Shorey was known as the “Lara Lappa Girl ” till she died in poverty unsung and unknown in Pakistan. Badi Behen (Husnlal-Bhagatram), Dillagi and Dulari (Naushad Ali), Baazaar( Shyamsunder) and Patanga (C Ramchandra) were the other hit musicals in 1949.
In 1949, the Censor Board started the “A ” category,Films division was established, India’s First luxury Theatre ‘Liberty “was opened in Bombay, Navketan Productions of Dev Anand was established and ‘Movie Times ‘ magazine started publishing film news.
By 1949, Naushad Ali and C Ramchandra were competing with each other for the No. 1 slot. Both respected each other. Next few years,their competition gave superlative music to Indian music lovers. This was everybody’s gain. The Playback singers’ group was coming to a final shape with Lata,Asha,Geeta,Shamshad and all others in that order,for female singers. For males, it was Mohd. Rafi,Mukesh,Kishore,Talat and Manna Dey and all others in that order. Very shortly,the first 3 in each group were the survivors for a longer run, the rest remaining on the scene without any consequence !
Out of the Music Directors, those who debuted or excelled in the late 40s only survived and prospered. Naushad,Shankar-Jaikishen,S D Burman,Roshan, C.Ramchandra,Husnlal- Bhagatram and all others in that order. In due course, the first few proved to be long distance runners. By late 70s this generation of composers was slowly getting replaced by the next generation composers.
The story of Sunehre Din was a routine story of a Love Triangle, and the usual sacrifice by one of them to unite the lovers. 1949 was a period when Rehana was in Top gear. She was the darling of the front benchers. One could call her the original ‘Jhatka queen’ of those days. She was an exotic dancer but acting wise she was almost a zero. She could only roll her eyes and make funny faces, that’s all. Raj Kapoor, who started as a Hero only in 1947, was still a novice. After Neelkamal-47, Jail yatra-47, Chitod Vijay-47, Gopinath-48, Amar Prem-48 and Aag-48, this was just the seventh film of Raj Kapoor as a hero. With the entire focus of the story on Rehana, he did not have much to do in the film except as a supporting actor to Rehana.
Premendra(Raj Kapoor),son of the wealthy Raibahadur(Ramesh Sinha), is a singer on All India Radio. Renuka Kumari(Rehana) is a middle class girl. She and her two rich sahelis-AshaSinha(Roop Kamal) and Latarani(Nigar Sultana) are Premendra’s great fans. One day they all go to the A.I.R.Studio to meet him. Premendra and Renuka meet outside the studio and fall in love. She did not know his identity at that time. Inside the studio, these girls are introduced to Bedi, as Premendra. Later Asha and Lata find out the truth. Asha also starts loving him.(Thankfully, Lata does not fall in love. Nigar sultana does excessive Tomboyish acting here). Due to the pressure of his father, Premendra’s marriage is fixed with the rich girl Asha. When she comes to know that he is in true love with Renuka, Asha sacrifices her love and goes far off, allowing the lovers to unite. End of the film !
The songs of this film were very popular. Personally I too liked some of the songs like ‘ Bahoron ne jise chheda hai’ -Mukesh, and ‘ maine dekhi jag ki reet’- Shamshad and Mukesh. However the maker of these popular songs did not get the due fame and respect for his work.
GYAN DUTT (Born 1915/1920 – Died on 3 December 1974) was an early Indian Film Composer and Music Director. He was Music Director for films such as Thokar (1939), Achhut (1940), Bhakta Surdas (1942), Sunehre Din (1949) and Ghayal (1951). Many of his songs were sung by K. L. Saigal. In 1948 he composed seven songs for a young Geeta Roy in the films Chanda Ki Chandani and Hua Savera, although their most notable collaboration was Dilruba (1950) in which Geeta Roy had 10 songs, seven of which were solos for Geeta Roy.
There were a few composers who were neither here nor there. Gyan Dutt was one of them. True, in his time there was no Parallel cinema, but Critics were very much there. Though he operated from 1937 to 1965-almost 30 years, he never became famous as some of his contemporaries like, Anil Biswas, C.Ramchandra, Naushad etc. He was a Bengali born in Bangalore. There are conflicting reports not only about his Birth year (1915 or 1920),but also about Birth place. Some sources say he was born in East Bengal.
As was the practice those days, Gyan Dutt ( real name Jnanan Dutt) was employed by Ranjit studios ( “we have more stars in our studio than there are in the sky”), along with other composers. He composed music for 25 films in Ranjit from 1937 to 1940. Khemchand Prakash, who replaced him in Ranjit did 20 films from 1940 to 1945 and then it was Bulo C Rani who did about 25 films after 1945 onwards. For most films of Gyan Dutt in Ranjit the film directors were Gujaratis like Jayant Desai, Chaturbhuj Doshi, Chandulal Shah, Manibhai Vyas etc. He was called Pandit Gyan Dutt.
In those days, heroes and Heroines used to sing their own songs. Thus his songs were sung by Waheedan bai, Khatoon, Kalyani,Sunita Devi, Ila Devi, Madhuri, Sitara, Indubala, Vasanti, Savita Devi, Miss Rose, Meera, Gauhar, Snehprabha Pradhan etc.Among males it was Ishwarlal, Kantilal, Ghori, Bilimoria, Charlie etc.
Gyan Dutt gave music to 58 films and composed 604 songs, but songs from only Saigal’s Bhakta Surdas-42 and Raj kapoor’s Sunehre Din 49 are well known. Actually songs of Aapki Marzi-39 and Sant Tulsidas-39 were also popular in those days. Khursheed sang many songs for him. Gyan Dutt also sang 15 songs in 9 films and wrote 13 song lyrics in 3 films as a Lyricist. As MD, his first film was Toofani Toli and the last film was Janam Janam ke sathi-65.
Gyan Datt remained employed with Ranjit Movietone and gave music to many films including Toofani Toli(1937), Bazigar (1938), Gorakh Maya (1938), Nadi kinare (39), Musafir (1940). In Toofani Toli he made Wahidan bai (Mother of Nimmi) sing “Kyon Nainan mein neer bahaye”. Many singers like Kantilal, Kalyani, Rajkumari, Khursheed and Manna Dey sang his songs. His last film was Janam janam ke saathi (1965) in which duet was sung by Mukesh & Suman Kalyanpur, Hemant Kumar &Indrani Roy.The most notable among his compositions being Sunehre Din (1949) and the song – Maine Dekhi Jag Ki Reet Meet Sab Jhoote Pad Gaye sung by Mukesh and Shamshad Begum.
His death came on 3-12-1974 in Bombay. Unfortunately except for a small time less known composer Sapan Chakravarty, no one from the film industry attended his funeral and a good composer died unsung, unknown and all alone.
Here is a triade from this film, sung by Geeta Roy, Shamshad Begum and Sulochana Kadam. Enjoy….
Song-Umangon ke din beete jaayen (Sunehre Din)(1949) Singers- Shamshad Begam, Geeta Roy,Sulochana Kadam, Lyricist- D.N.Madhok, MD- Gyan Dutt
Chorus
Lyrics
umangon ke din beete jaayen
beetate
beetate ye din haath na aayen
jawaanee ke din hain ye
haaye jawaanee ke din hain ye
kisee kee ho ja ree goree
kisee ko apna bana le
goree
jawaanee ke gun gaa le
umangon ke din beete jaayen
beet ke ye din haath na aayen
jawaanee ke din hain ye
haaye jawaanee ke din hain ye
kisee kee ho ja re goree
kisee ko apna bana le
goree
jawaanee ke gun gaa le
jawaanee ek nasha hai
jawaanee ek maza hai
ke jismein
ke jisme insaan jhoome
aap apne ko choome
jawaanee ek nasha hai
jawaanee ek maza hai
ke jisme
ke jisme insaan jhoome
aap apne ko choomen
kisee ki ho ja ree goree
kisee ko apna bana le
goree
jawaanee ke gun gaa le
umangon ke din beete jaaye
beet ke ye din haath na aayen
jawaanee ke din hain ye
haaye jawaanee ke din hain ye
kisee ki ho ja ree goree
kisee ko apna bana le
goree
jawaanee ke gun gaa le
jawaanee ek taraana
ke jisko
ke jisko sune zamaana
jisko gaaye wo dil
ke jispe banee ho mushkil
jawaanee ek taraana
ke jisko
ke jisko sune zamaana
jisko gaaye wo dil
ke jispe banee ho mushkil
kisee kee ho ja ree goree
kisee ko apna bana le
goree
jawaanee ke gun gaa le
umangon ke din beete jaayen
beet ke ye din haath na aayen
jawaanee ke din hain ye
haaye jawaanee ke din hain ye
kisee kee ho ja ree goree
kisee ko apna bana le
goree
jawaanee ke gun gaa le
umangon ke din beete jaayen
beet ke ye din hath na aayen
jawaanee ke din hain ye
haaye jawaanee ke din hain ye
kisee ki ho ja ree goree
kisee ko apna bana le
goree
jawaanee ke gun gaa le
2 Responses to "Umangon ke din beete jaayen"
November 30, 2025 at 11:13 pm
Good Evening,
This is a very beautiful song.
I am not able to recollect, but there is another song composed on similar tune. May be the base Raga is same. Hope some of our members could identify.
Thanks for sharing this melodious song.
Blessings
Uma🙏
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Atul’s Song A Day- A choice collection of Hindi Film & Non-Film Songs 
November 30, 2025 at 10:13 pm
Sunehre Din was a nice movie and perhaps the first movie of Raj Kapoor with playback by Mukesh.
On Sun, 30 Nov, 2025, 5:00 am Atul’s Song A Day- A choice collection of
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