Shubh din aaye shubh din aaye
Posted on: February 10, 2026
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 social film, Rangeela-1953.
The film was produced and directed by Master Bhagwan for his own banner Bhagwan Art Productions, Bombay.The cast included Bhagwan, Poornima,Vivek, badri prashad, Baburao pehalwan, heera Sawant, Madhav Kale, Kammo, Cuckoo, Indira and a host of Bhagwan’s regular artists. Unlike other films of Bhagwan, C.Ramchandra did not give music to this film as he was busy with the film Anarkali-1953. So, Jamal Sen was the Music Director. Though a gifted and talented musician, he was known to be an unlucky Music Director.
In the year 1953, 2 films that impressed the audience were by Bimal Roy. One was Parineeta. It was a classic film based on the famous novel by Sharat Chandra Chatterjee. ” Do Bigha Zameen’ , based on a short story by Salil Chaudhari was a hit film nationally and internationally. Bimal, greatly influenced by the ‘ Nehru Socialism’ and the” Italian New Wave Films” , made this film showing the pathetic story of a poor land owner of Bihar, coming to a big city like Calcutta and becoming a Rickshaw Puller, with an unrealistic hope of making enough money to get back his mortgaged piece of land. This touching story won several awards, but one American film critic wrote ” It is very strange that a filmmaker from a newly independent nation of India has such a negative picture of his own country ! How will it motivate people to be successful in life ? ”
On the positive side, there was the musical Anarkali , the biggest Hit of 1953. When the film Mughal e Azam, a film on the same story, was released in 1960, film Anarkali was also re-released and it did a very good business. Raj kapoor’s Aah was good but the audience did not like Raj Kapoor’s ‘Dilip Kumar style’ acting as well as Pran doing the role of a good gentleman doctor, instead of his usual villain style acting. However, the songs became popular.
Other notable films were Boot polish, Patita, Shikast, Aas, Jeewan Jyoti, Raahi, Foot path, Jhamela, AVM’s Ladki etc. Film Mayur pankh introduced Asha Mathur and some foreign artists. Nehru’s favourite slogan ‘Vividhata mein Ekta’ was used as a theme in the film Teen batti Char Rasta, by V.Shantaram. He also presented the socialist theme of ‘ Rich-poor’ struggle in the film Surang. First Geva colour film Shahenshah was brought by G.P.Sippy.
Guru Dutt and O.P.Nayyar came together for the first time in the film Baaz. The National Film Awards started and the first award went to Marathi film ” Shyamchi Aai “, made by P.K.Atre starring Vanmala. Filmfare awards also started. Prabhat film company closed down. Music Director Ghulam Haider died in Pakistan.
In the 50’s decade of the ” Golden Era “so many great movies were made, which were Musicals, Entertainers and films with a social message, that average films or films deficient in contents could not compete with the hit and popular films . While the ratio of the Hit films was around 60 %, still there were about 30 % films in every year below standard and about 10% films were outright flops. In this decade, every film made by Bhagwan, except his first social film ” Albela “-1951, proved to be below average or total flops. Here comes the “LUCK” factor.
In the filmy duniya, i.e. the Film Industry, the LUCK factor plays a very vital role. Everything and everybody is labelled as Lucky or Unlucky. Actors, directors, Music Directors, Film Titles, colour of the dresses, Places of shooting, small items,big items…everything is branded with Luck !
This Luck thing is shown even in films also. I remember that in the film Deewaar-75, the Coolie Badge bearing the auspicious number of 786 is lucky for the Hero. It saves his life a few times. In the end, when he loses the Badge, he gets killed.
Let us see a few cases of Lucky-Unlucky in the film world. We all know the famous actor and director Gajanan Jagirdar, but few know that he was branded Unlucky. Padosi-41 was Jagirdar’s first film with Prabhat film company. By the time the film was complete Shantaram and some of his friends left Prabhat making it crippled. The second time that Jagirdar worked in a Prabhat film ‘Ramshastri’-44, the important partner Vishnupant Damle died and Prabhat almost collapsed. The third time that Jagirdar worked for Prabhat was in the film ‘Lokmanya Tilak’. At that time the company was auctioned and it was closed down forever ! When Jagirdar worked in “Shahir Parshuram” of Mangal pictures, the company went bankrupt and closed down. In 1953, top production company Alhad Chitra employed Jagirdar for a bilingual film, “Mahatma”-53. The film not only flopped, it drowned the company and the Producer Datta Dharmadhikari came on the road. He started a roadside kitchen for survival !
Second example is that of the screen pair of Rajendra Kumar and Waheeda Rehman. Their first film “Nirmala”, made by Dalsukh Pancholi was abandoned because Pancholi died. Their next film was ‘Paalki ‘ directed by S.U.Sunny. S U Sunny died half way into the making of the film and the film also flopped. Their next film was S.S.Vasan’s “Shatranj”. Vasan died before the film was released!. Their next film was ‘Dharati’, directed by Shridhar whose wife died and he got Cancer. He left the film ! After this, thankfully, Rajendra Kumar refused to work with Waheeda Rehman.
Talking of Master Bhagwan and his series of failed films, all ending with “La”, it was a game of Lucky and Unlucky titles for Bhagwan. To celebrate the fantastic success of film Albela-51, C.Ramchandra had given a party at his Dadar residence-Saiprasad. Many people from the industry were present. They were all asking Bhagawan about his next film and he was replying that nothing has been fixed as yet. P.L.Santoshi had also come for the party. He suddenly announced that Bhagwan’s next film was “Jhamela”. Stunned, Bhagwan took him in a corner and asked why he did so. Santoshi said, “Bhagwan, film titles with ‘LA” at the end are Lucky for you.” Bhagwan remembered that his first film as a Producer was Badla-43 and it was a Hit film. Later another film, ‘Bhedi Bangla”-49 was also a Hit film. He was convinced and film Jhamela took birth. Though Jhamela was a flop, Bhagwan started making ‘Rangeela’-53.
Actually, till then all earlier films having the name Rangeela in their titles were failures, like Rangeela Dost, Rangeela Mazdoor, Rangeela Musafir, Rangeela Rajasthan, Rangeela Rajpoot etc. In the film ‘Rangeela Musafir’-50, Bhagwan himself was the Hero and the film had flopped, but the Ghost of LA had swarmed Bhagwan completely and he made Rangeela. As expected, it was a resounding flop. Later another film “Rangeela Raja”-60 featuring Bhagwan also flopped. Not only Jhamela and Rangeela, but other films made by him and ending with LA, like Hallgulla, kar Bhala, Sachche ka Bolbala, La Bela were all Unlucky for Bhagwan. He had never realised that the ALBELA success was NOT due to name, but because of C.Ramchandra’s iconic music and Geeta Bali’s charm. The story too was original at that time. The public empathised with the Hero. Later half hearted copies of the story failed to recreate that magic.
After the phenomenal success of Albela-51,Master Bhagwan was on cloud nine and he floated his own production company, Bhagwan Art Productions. He already owned Jagriti films and Jagriti Studios. He started making films after films. The result was as expected. Slowly but steadily, Bhagwan started falling into the trap of huge debts due to unsuccessful films produced by him.
After a while, a day came when Bhagwan had to sell all his ten cars one by one, Sea facing Bungalow at Juhu etc and at the end of his career, he had to live in a one room tenement in a chawl,on the very street in Dadar named after his own uncle.
The story of the film Rangeela-1953 was a story of a village boy-Babulal, who is eager to study in school, but due to his wicked stepmother, has to do household chores instead. Fed up of this and to try his luck,he runs away to Bombay,where he meets Vidya Devi,a kind and young school teacher,who not only helps him but also starts teaching him,seeing his earnestness.Over a period,to sustain himself,Babulal,who was called Buddu in his village gets educated and also sells Chana,near to hisschool.Duely,he becomes a successful businessman,owning a shop,house etc.He is under the impression that Vidya Devi is in his love,but he is disillusioned when he hears a conversation between Vidya and her would behusband. Vidya refers to him as a good and honest student only.
Babulal learns that his father is in financial troubles and his house is up forauction.To help father,he collects all his money and is about to leave for village,when he learns that Vidya’s marriage to her fiance is in trouble,as Vidya’s father can not gather that much money.
Babulal is in two minds. Finally he gives the money to her father for marriage,sells his shop,business and house to collect money and leaves for the village to help father.
One of the cast members was Indira, who made her Debut with this film. This is a ‘Same Name Confusion’ artiste. During the silent Era and early Talkie period, there was one Indira Devi. Her real name was Effie Hippolet- an Anglo-Indian She acted in 24 silent films since 1927, but did only two Talike films-Al-Hilal-35 and Wamaq Azra-1935. Then there is the comedian fatty Indira Bansal who was operative from 1951 to 1981, and worked in 116 films. This Indira was different.
Indira, one of Punjabi cinema’s most popular leading ladies of the 1960s, was born on August 6, 1938 in northern India. Growing up in an aristocratic family in the Punjab village of Kharian, her family lost everything when they had to flee their home during partition to settle in Kanpur. In 1952 her family shifted to Bombay where an Elder brother ran a successful business.
Indira was noticed by the popular comedian Bhagwan while he was shooting a movie at Jagriti Studios, and she was put in the cast of his film Rangeela (1953). Raj Kapoor, who happened to be visiting the set of Rangeela, noticed Indira and later cast her as the daughter of a rich industrialist in his film Shree 420 (1955).
Indira continued to appear in supporting roles in major Hindi productions like Funtoosh (1956),Devta-(1956), Mirza Sahibaan-1957, Yahudi (1958), and Dil Deke Dekho(1959). She had just appeared as the lead in the low budget yarn Jungle Ki Duniya (1959) when she was cast as the heroine in a Punjabi film titled Yamla Jatt in 1960. This was followed that same year by two more Punjabi pictures, Do Lacchian and Kiklee. All three films were very successful.
Returning to Hindi language movies, she found herself much in demand for B-films with colorful titles like Maya Mahal (1963), Jungle Boy (1963), Tarzan Aur Jadugar (1963), Pahadi Nagin (1964), Arab Ka Lal (1964), Son of Zimbo (1966), Sheba and Hercules (1967), Tarzan in Fairyland (1968) and CID Agent 302 (1968), sometimes playing the heroine, but more often than not as a vamp or villain. Occasionally she would snag a nice supporting role in a major production like Do Dil (1965) or Mere Huzoor (1968), and she still continued to star in Punjabi fare.
Sometimes billed as Indira Billi (her real name was Indira Kaur) she was interviewed in 1963 for Picture Post magazine where she talked about her beginnings: “I had not the good fortune of stepping into films and finding myself a heroine right from the start as had been the case with many glamor girls these days. It was a life of toil and tears, fighting every inch, every day, and month after month. Sometimes I was fed up, and felt tired of the ceaseless struggle to make my presence felt. With the struggle for existence keen and with not enough money, those early days were none too happy for a girl aspiring for a respectable place in the film world, let alone stardom. Sometimes I had my misgivings whether I was right in coming into films. Some kind of inferiority complex took hold of me and I thought several times that I would never become a star.”
Indira married cinema owner Shiv Kumar in the early to mid-1960s and left the film scene in the early 1970s.(Thanks to shri Mike Barnum ji and his blog-cinemajadoo.com, wiki and my notes).
Here is today’s song, sung by Asha, Rafi and Chorus. Enjoy….
Song- Shubh din aaye shubh din aaye (Rangeela)(1953) Singers- Asha Bhonsle, Rafi, Lyricst- S H Bihari, MD- Jamal Sen
Chorus
Lyrics
aa aa aa aa
aa aa aa aa
aa aa aa
aa aa aa
aa aa aa
aa aa aa
aa aa aa
aa aa aa
aa aa aa
shubh din aaye
shubh din aaye
shubh din aaye
shubh din aaye
naache bina gaaye bina raha naheen jaaye
mohse raha naheen jaaye
shubh din aaye shubh din aaye
chale dheere dheere
o o o o o o
o chale dheere dheere
pawan matwaalee pawan matwaalee
doley kamae jaise amuwa kee daalee oye
amuwa kee daalee
o re piya dekh mora jiya sharmaaye
mora jiya sharmaaye
shubh din aaye shubh din aaye
shubh din aaye shubh din aaye
chanda sa mukhda goree ee ee ee ee ee ee
ho chanda sa mukhda goree
kaahe ko dhaanke
kaahe ko dhaanke
dekh le ye rang zara ghoonghat hata ke
goree ghoonghat hata ke
laaj teree aaj mere man ko na bhaaye
goree man ko na bhaaye
shubh din aaye shubh din aaye
shubh din aaye shubh din aaye
chhodo sajan moree ee ee ee ee ee ee
ho chhodo sajan moree bainyya dharo na
bainyya dharo na
arre baar baar ye bahaar aaye na aaye
goree aaye na aaye
shubh din aaye shubh din aaye
ho shubh din aaye shubh din aaye
naache bina gaaye bina raha naheen jaye
mohse raha naheen jaye
shubh din aaye shubh din aaye
ho shubh din aaye shubh din aaye
Atul’s Song A Day- A choice collection of Hindi Film & Non-Film Songs 
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