Chaley gaye dil ke daamangeer
Posted on: March 7, 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 the film Gopinath-1948.
The film was directed by Mahesh Kaul and the music was by Ninu Mujumdar. The lyrics of the film’s 9 songs had a mix of 2 songs each by Meerabai and Surdas and 5 songs by Ram Murti Chaturvedi. The cast of the film included Raj Kapoor, Tripti Mitra, Latika, Anwari Bai, Firoz, Mahesh Kaul and others.
1948 was a year when the filmmakers breathed a sigh of relief, because now there was no restriction on making films openly on our Independence efforts or having songs of patriotism and Indian culture.
Film Shaheed made by Filmistan was based on the 1942 Quit India Movement. This was Dilip Kumar’s first Hit film.
Bombay Talkies made Majboor on the exit of the British from India. There was a song also describing it.
Internationally famous dancer Uday Shankar made ‘Kalpana’ glorifying different dances of india. It ran well in Calcutta, but other places it had a lukewarm reception.
Suhag Raat by Kidar Sharma -his best in career- presented Geeta Bali (who resembled his wife Kamala Chaterjee), as a Heroine for the first time. She too did justice to her role.
Raj Kapoor established his RK Studio and made Aag with 3 heroines- Nargis, Kamini Kaushal and Nigar Sultana. He did not match them, but managed well with good songs.
Another Dilip film Mela was full of melodious songs. Suraiya’s Pyar ki jeet too was a musical.
Chandralekha from the South created history with its impressive challenge to Hindi films. Lavishly made and released with over 600 prints all over India at the same time it indicated the future competition from southern films !
Dev Anand’s Vidya and Ziddi made an impression.
Kishore Kumar sang his first song in Ziddi. Asha Bhosle sang her first solo in Chunaria. Anokhi Ada with veteran Naseem and Surendra was successful. Grihasthi, Pagdi, Gopinath, Nadiya ke Paar etc were other notable films.
Film Gopinath-1948 is not a famous film, nor is it known to everyone, but you will be surprised if I tell you that this film is named one of the Top Classics of Indian Cinema ! It is true. This film is also rated as the best film of Mahesh Kaul, who was known to be a very sensitive director. The title of the film Gopinath was a symbolic one because no one in the film was named Gopinath. The heroine’s name was Gopi and she desperately wanted to marry the Hero, hence possibly the name Gopinath! The film was conceptualised and written by Mahesh Kaul, who did a role of a film director named ‘Mahesh Kaul’ in the film! The film was released on 17-5-1948 in Bombay. I had seen this film in Hyderabad in its second run in the early 50’s, but I had my notes on this film.
The Film “GOPINATH” was written, co-produced and directed by MAHESH KAUL (1911-1972), a Kashmiri Pandit by birth but greatly influenced by Bengali Literature and Cinema. “Gopinath” starred one film old RAJ KAPOOR as the Hero, pitted against the talented and versatile star from the IPTA stable, TRIPTI MITRA (1925-1989 ). A highly unlikely combination, and never seen after. But, if you see the Film, Tripti sets the screen on fire with her histrionics, and surprisingly, a novice Raj Kapoor rises to the occasion, almost matching her, shot for shot !
The Film – a tragedy – centres around a Cinema Story Writer’s obsession for a Film Heroine who plays with the Writer’s emotions to extract the meatiest role for herself, and a destitute girl’s (played by Tripti) love for the Writer, in whose house she is given shelter by his mother. By the time the Writer realises his folly and returns to the hapless girl at home, it is too late – she loses her mind and is admitted to a Mental Asylum. You might say Devdas in reverse.
Some say that the Film is based on the life of Mahesh Kaul himself, who incidentally plays himself i.e. Mahesh Kaul, the Film Director in “Gopinath”.
The Film was the highest box office grosser of 1948, catapulted Raj Kapoor to fame ( sadly Tripti Mitra returned to Bengal to take up work related to BOHUROOPI along with her husband Shombhu Mitra, the well known Playwright, also of IPTA ). It was considered a Classic and is one of the few films stored in the National Archives at Delhi by the Govt.
( Most Films are stored in the National Film Archives at Pune ).
The film’s director Mahesh Kaul ( 10-4-1911 to 2-7-1972) was born in Lahore and educated in Moni College, Nagpur. After graduation, he worked as a journalist and a Bank manager.
He then entered films as a Lyricist and dialogue writer. He debuted as an actor in K.A.Abbas scripted film ‘ Naya Sansar’-41 and played Dronacharya’s role in film Mahatma Vidur-43. His other films as an actor were Apna Ghar-42, Gopinath-48, Kagaz ke phool-59 and Tere Mere Sapne-71. His first film as a Director was Angoori-43. Then came Paristan-44.
He produced and directed the film Gopinath-48, with Raj Kapoor and IPTA actress Tripti Mitra. Some of his major films were Naujawan-51,, Akhri Dao-58,Talaaq-58, Kagaz ke phool-59, Sautela Bhai-62, Palki-67, Sapnon ka saudagar-68, etc.
In all he directed 15 Hindi films. His last film Agni Rekha came after his death, in 1973.
His close friend, actor Janaki Dass wrote this about his last days, ” My friend, director Mahesh Kaul, gave to the Indian screen such great stars as Raj Kapoor in his maiden production Gopinath, Prem Nath in Naujawan, Rajendra Kumar in Talaq, Mehmood in Abhimaan and Hema Malini in Sapnon Ka Saudagar. He died of a fatal disease in Nanavati Hospital. Mahesh Kaul was so much in need of money that he could not afford medicines. At that juncture, I took Dev Anand for whom he was writing a story Appointment with Destiny and also enacting ironically, a dying man’s role in his Tere Mere Sapne. We entered his room. He was conscious, and complaining.
“You haven’t even invited me to see your Tere Mere Sapne, in which I play a dying man’s role. Dev Anand hurriedly replied: “As soon as you get well, we’ll see it together and without waiting for an answer, he thrust a bundle of notes at me and left, I put the money into Kaul’s lap. “This is from Dev Anand.” “Charity?” he asked and flung the money (notes) at me. I collected them again and said: “You’ve misunderstood me — this is the balance of the money for An Appointment With Destiny and he calmed down and accepted the money. After a few days in response to a phone call from the hospital, I rushed there fearing the worst. He beckoned me to his side, caught hold of my hand, and whispered: “The soul never gives long company to the body. It must part one day.” “But you’re alright now,” I assured him.
A faint smile lurked on his withered face, and said “only Dev’s advances for writing An Appointment With Destiny remains all right.”
He went blank again, murmuring: “lights on… camera …” and left us forever, to keep his Appointment with destiny. ”
Music Director Ninu Mujumdar is not one of the more popular MDs of Hindi films. Ninu (Niranjan) Majumdar was born on 9-9-1915 in a Gujarati Nagar Brahmin family of Baroda (Vadodara). Ninu was a pet name that he became famous for. His real name was Niranjan, which he later used as a pen name in his Gazals. His father, Nagendra Mazumdar made silent films. He was also a Music Director and Lyricist in his time. Ninu Majumdar’s name is variously written as Mujumdar, Muzumdar, Majumdar and Mazumdar.
After the early influence of Faiyaz Khan, Mazumdar’s search took him to various routes and he studied different kinds of music before he came into his own to become one of the first Gujarati Sugam Sangeet (light music) singers. He soon graduated to composing his own music and writing songs. Apart from classical music, the earlier influence was also of Ravindra Sangeet. This was at the time when Bengali language enjoyed prestige among Gujaratis of a kind that was comparable to the status of French among the English speaking nations. He grew out of it in a few years.
The more lasting influence on his music was that of folk songs and semi-classical music of Uttar Pradesh (U.P.) like the Hori, Chaiti, Barkha Biraha as well asThumri and Dadra. He learned these during his stint in U.P. where he did farming for some years and also kept in touch through association with people like Satyendra Trivedi, a connoisseur of music and the “Thumri Queen”, Siddheshwari Devi, a family friend and his wife Kaumudi’s Guru.
Ninu’s ambition, even when he started his schooling in music at Baroda, was to become a music director in films. From 1937 onwards he participated in light Gujarati musical programmes. He also produced several features for All India Radio. From 1954, Mazumdar worked with All India Radio in Mumbai for over 20 years as Light Music Producer. He would have liked to take part in Hindi programmes too but the shortage of Gujarati artists forced him to concentrate on programmes in that language.
When in charge of music for the newly launched Vividh Bharati, that had to compete with Radio Ceylon without using any film music (film music was not played on AIR for several years due to conflicts over contracts and royalties), he successfully produced programmes inviting Salil Chaudhary, Kanu Ghosh and others from Bombay Youth Choir or IPTA and using voices of Manna Dey and other well known artists. Later when the issue of royalties was settled between the film producers and AIR, Mazumdar was the first to produce the popular Jaymala Programme by interviewing eminent persons from the film industry.
A career in films was also cut out for Ninu Mazumdar, as his father, Nagendra Mazumdar, was a dramatist and film producer. Nagendra was not much of a musician but he imparted his son training in music from the very early days.
Ninu found the field restricted, in a way in films, because of the need of working at a very fast pace and with a view to pleasing the majority among the public. Ninu tried to introduce a new trend in film music, that of, adding a classical touch by borrowing from the old masters like Surdas. These attempts met with considerable success in Gopinath, a picture in which Ninu had interest as a producer as well.
It was in films made in the forties that a young Ninu Mazumdar’s voice could be heard. He sang with Sardar Akhtar in “Uljhan”, with Amirbai Karnataki in “Paristan” and Meena Kapoor in “Gopinath”.
He provided music for Jail Yatra-47 and Gopinath-48, two of the earliest Raj Kapoor films. It is well documented by now that the Yashomati Maiyase Puche Nandlala song in RK movie Satyam Shivam Sundaram is a direct lift from Mazumdar’s Aai Gori Radhika in Gopinath.
He also composed music for several Gujarati Films like “Jeevano Jugari”, “Okha Haran”, “Sharad Poonam” etc.
He sang and penned quite a few of his songs. Amongst others who sang for him were Meena Kapoor, Shamshad Begum, Geeta Dutt, Suraiya, Hameetha Banu, Pradeepji, C.H.Atma, Ameerbai Karnataki, Raj Kapoor, Shankar Dasgupta, S.D.Batish, Lakshmi Shankar, Talat Mehmood, Siddheshwari Devi, Rajkumar, Nalini Mulgaonkar, Dilip Dholakia, Ajeet Merchant, Shobha Gurtu, Sarla Bhide, Lata Mangeshkar, Asha Bhosale, Manna Dey, Kishori Amonkar, Usha Mangeshkar, Leela Mehta, Premlata Naik, Kishori Ghia, Suman Kalyanpur, Kaumudi Munshi,etc.
Veteran composer Ninu Mazumdar passed away on March 3 2000. Some of his songs have become so popular that people often do not even remember who wrote or composed them. He gave music to 20 Hindi films – Black out-1942,Amanat, Masterjee, School Master, Kiran, Paristan, Rangila Dost, Main kya karun, Gudiya, Jail yatra, Gopinath, Kuch naya, Aflatoon, Pul, Raj ratan, Ram Shastri, Aazmaaish,Teen Tasweeren, Bhai Saheb-54 and Punam ka chaand-67. He sang 28 songs in 13 films and directed 1 film-Kuchh naya-48. His son Uday gave music to the TV serial ” Buniyaad ” in the 80s.
Here is a song from this film, sung by Meena Kapoor. Enjoy the song….
Song- Chaley gaye dil ke daamangeer (Gopinath)(1948) Singer- Meena Kapoor, Lyricist- Surdas, MD-Ninu Mujumdar
Lyrics
Chaley gaye ae ae ae ae
chaley ae gaye dil ke ae daamangeer
dil ke ae daamangeer
chaley gaye ae ae ae ae
chaley ae gaye
dil ke ae daamangeer
jab sudhi aave pyaare daras ke ee ee ee
jab sudhi aave pyaare daras kee
uthhat kaleje peer
uthhat kaleje pee ee eer
chale gaye ae ae ae
ache ae gaye
dil ke daamangeer
brindavan bansee bat tyaagyo
bridavan bansee bat tyaagyo
tyaagyo jamuna nee eer
tyaagyo jamuna neer
brij gopin ko prem bisaaro o o o o o
brij gopin ko prem y
aise bhaye bepeer
aise bhaye bepee ee eer
dil ke ae daamangeer
dil ke ae daamangeer
Atul’s Song A Day- A choice collection of Hindi Film & Non-Film Songs 
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