Dhak dhak dhak dhak nis din saanjh sawere
Posted on: April 9, 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 Comedy cum Suspense cum Love story cum identical double role film Dhandora-1941.
Dhandora is a typical North Indian Hindi word, with which not many other state people may be aware of. Since there is an almost similar word with the same meaning, in Marathi, I knew about this word and so, maybe many Maharashtra readers too will know it.
Anyway, what is the meaning of the word Dhandora ? As per the online dictionary, the simplified meaning is Elaan in Urdu, Proclamation in English. In Hindi it is Doundi and in Marathi it is Dawandi (दवंडी).
To understand this concept, we have to go back in time, when the means of communication were not many. The Public orders,Fatwas, New laws or any new announcement from the King for the public was through a Public Crier ( as he was called), with a big drum hanging from his neck onto his tummy. He would stand on a Public platform, like a Chavdi or in the middle of a Market or Residential street. He would then start playing his drum loudly. When enough crowd had gathered, he would shout in a loud voice about the Proclamation from the authority. This entire process was called Dhandora or Dhandhora or Dhindhora ( the phrase “Dhindhora peetna” means to proclaim loudly ).
After the advent of modern and better means of communication, this system was abandoned. However, in smaller villages and rural areas, its variation continued as a means of advertisements. I remember, during the visits to my Nanihal- which was a small town, in the summer holidays, in the early 40’s, we children used to run after the oxen cart in which the ‘Public crier’ or the person doing the advertisement and distributing handbills sat. He would start banging his drum and shout the ad matter…mostly about a film.
Noor Mohd. Charlie – the hero of film Dhandora-41, who was also its Director, was Film industry’s First Superstar Comedian.
Coming from a very humble family, he rose to be the king of Comedy in Hindi films, for a period of over a decade.
By the 1940s the system of Playback was firmly established. This actually came as a great relief to most composers. Until then they had to tolerate terrible non-singers. Now, except for a few singing actors, all others could have playback from expert and professional singers. Despite this, in a few cases, some producers insisted that their comedians sang their own songs. That is how you can see songs by comedian Sunder, comedian Yaqub or comedian Charlie. Thank God other comedians like Master Bhagwan, V.H.Desai or Bhudo Advani did not / could not sing !
While on the subject of Hero’s singing in the films, in the early era of the Talkie films, it was an essential requirement for the lead actors, especially the hero, to sing his own songs. Thus, you will find that most Heroes sang their own songs in the films. However, there is one unique case, where the popular hero of 130 Hindi films from 1932 to 1965 ( he worked till 1975 in a total 170+ films, but in character roles) never sang a single song for himself !
Playback singing became common in the end of the 1930s, but Jairaj never sang a song himself. The reason – he could not sing at all. There is a real story about his singing. To help the non-singer actors, studios used to keep trained classical experts. Otherwise also most Music Directors in those days were classical singers themselves.
Thus, Jairaj too was expected to sing songs. He did not like singing, because he was horrible at singing. The Music Director of the film Patit paawan-33 was Prof.B.R.Deodhar, who was a classical singer himself. (Later on he established a musical school). He was determined to make Jairaj sing a song. (Durga Khote, in her Marathi autobiography has mentioned that all others, including herself, tried to desist Deodhar from it, but he was determined.) Finally a song was recorded and filmed-“prem magan sakhi”. Jairaj had sung it so badly that the song was removed from the film from the second show itself. Jairaj is probably the only Hero of those days who never sang in films. Even as a lip syncer of songs (after playback singing became the norm), Jairaj has sung less than 20 songs on screen despite acting in nearly 170 movies!
Coming back to today’s film-Dhandora-1941 ( sounds like Dhrandhar ?), it was made by Ranjit Movietone, Bombay and it was the only film directed by Charlie himself. Music was provided by Gyan Dutt for the 9 songs written by D.N.Madhok (7) and Buta Ram Sharma (2). The cast of the film was Charlie , Dixit, Ghory, Shamim, Husn Bano, E. Billimoria, Kesari, A. Shah and many others.
The story of the film was rather an offbeat one and I don’t think this story was ever repeated in any other film as far as I know. Here is the story…..
Two young persons, Pyare (Charlie) and Mansukh(Dikshit) are working as Extras in films. They are actually nobodies, but crave for publicity in some way or the other. Pyare and Mansukh give it a long thought and come up with a crazy idea. It is planned that Mansukh should ‘murder’ Pyare. Then Mansukh will be caught and their names will be flashed on front pages of Newspapers and on Radio news. Thus they will become famous. The murder, of course , has to be only a fake one. Then Pyare would go out of Bombay and appear directly in court, when Mansukh would be convicted.
Everything takes place as planned. Mansukh is arrested. Pyare leaves secretly for Calcutta. In the train Pyare meets Banwari (Bhagwan Das)-a Theatre Manager and his beautiful daughter Kumud (Husn Bano). They continue meeting in Calcutta also and as expected, fall in love. In all this jhamela, Pyare forgets about Mansukh.
One day Pyare comes across a stupid fellow-Uttam ( Charlie’s double role), who looks exactly like him (naturally!). Uttam is the son of Calcutta’s richest person Sir Niranjan (E.Billimoria). For a better period of the film,after Interval, there are many scenes depicting the inevitable and sometimes intentional confusions due to the look-alikes.
In Bombay, Mansukh is dragged to the court and his case starts. There is no Pyare anywhere,as planned. Mansukh loses all hope. He is convicted and sentenced to death by hanging. Fortunately, when Mansukh is dragged to the Hangman’s rope, Pyare appears and clarifies that he is alive and there was no murder at all. Mansukh released Baa-ijjat.
The Happy End !
One of the actors in this film was E. Billimoria. His case is very different. He entered the film world only by accident. E.(Eddie or Adi) Billimoria ( 1900-1981) came into film acting by accident. Eddie Billimoria was born in 1900 in Kirkee, a cantonment town near Poona, where his father worked in the ordinance factory. At 13 he ran away to join the railways as a fireman, hoping as many boys do to become an engine driver. Unfortunately, he fell ill and for a change of climate his parents took him to Bombay. There for the first time he saw a film – a silent American film. And it was then as he says, “that my troubles started.”
In Kirkee he couldn’t see any films as the only cinema hall was meant exclusively for British soldiers. Indians were not allowed. Eddie got around this by becoming a gate-keeper. During his spare time he hung around the projectionist cabin, and one day when the projectionist walked off in a drunken fit, Eddie got his job. Soon he decided to try his luck as a projectionist in Bombay. At nights he slept in the Azad Maidan and during the day he hung around the Excelsior and Empire cinemas hoping for a job. One night his hat, shoes and coat were stolen and Eddie felt the world had come to an end. Seeing the shoeless, coatless, hatless boy “from a good family” a kindly projection equipment dealer offered him a job. After this Eddie demonstrated and installed projection equipment in almost a thousand cinemas all over the country.
One day, he went to meet his younger brother D.Billimoria ( Dinshaw Billimoria), who had joined the film industry as an actor, in a studio. Both brothers, being Parsis, looked similar. The make-up man of that studio mistook E. for D. Billimoria, and without caring about his protests,did his make-up. What’s more, the director immediately gave him a role in that silent movie,”Punjab Mail”-1929 too. Eddie enjoyed this confusion and did what was told. Thus he entered the cinema world. His first film as a Hero was Raj Ramani. He did 7 silent films with Imperial and 10 with Ranjit studios. At Imperial, he met a young man Prithviraj Kapoor, who worked as an extra there. After the arrival of Talkie films, Eddie was Hero in 32 Ranjit films. With actress Madhuri alone he did 15 films. He was called Dev Anand of Stunt films.He was the first Cowboy Hero of India.
Then for some time he was with Paramount owned by Kikubhai Desai. Desai’s sudden death led to the end of Eddie’s career as a leading man. After this he started accepting character roles, but even these were few and far between. Finally, he had to resort to playing an extra in crowd scenes.
After 1938, he did character roles and after 1953,as an extra in any film to survive. In old age he did service in a Fridge and A.C. shop. E.Billimoria died on 18-2-1981 in his own flat in Kemps corner, Bombay. He has worked in 73 Talkie films, directed 1 film,-Sone ki chidiya-48. He even sang 4 songs in 4 films,as per HFGK. His first Talkie film was Radha Rani or Divine lady-1932 and the last film was Honeymoon-73. What a coincidence ! Worked in 73 films and the last film was in ’73 !( Thanks for some information taken from Cineplot and from book,”Inhe na bhulana” by Shri Harish Raghuwanshi ji ).
Another small time actor in this film was A.Shah. who was quite a popular comedian those days. A Shah aka Aziz Shah was born in 1910, at Sialkot. He did not have much schooling, except primary education at Lyallpur and at Islamia High School, Lahore. Due to his rich and sweet voice, he used to recite Holy Quran, on farmaish. He wrote poetry also.
He joined Saroj Movietone in 1930, under Mohan Bhavnani as an artiste at Rs.40 p.m. He acted in ‘Shakuntala’-31 and ‘Gul Bakavli’-32. He had to take a 2 year break, due to an illness. Back in Bombay, he worked in the film ‘Fidai Tohid’-34 as a hero. He gave music to the film ‘Gunehgar’-36. He wrote dialogues for ‘Mother India’-38 and ‘Daughters of India’-39. His first comic role was in Ranjit’s ‘Mirza Sahiban’-35. He became famous with his role in Punjabi film ‘Kurmai’-41.
His best role came in ‘Sharada’-42, as Munshi Udharchand Shikarpuri. This was repeated by him in the film ‘Keemat’-46. Some of his 11 films were, ‘Dhandora’-41, ‘Armaan’-42, ‘Sukh Dukh’-42, ‘Kanoon’-43, ‘Sanjog’-43, ‘Geet’-44 and ‘Ek Din Ka Sultan’-45. After 1947, he stopped acting and wrote lyrics in films like ‘Raat Ki Rani’-49, ‘Namoona’-49 and ‘Ek Teri Nishani’-49. After this he migrated to Pakistan and we have no further information about him anymore. Baburao Patel of Film India magazine was his fan.
Here is today’s song, sung by Charlie and Shamim. Enjoy….
Song- Dhak dhak dhak dhak nis din saanjh savere (Dhandhora)(1941) Singers- Charlie, Shamim, Lyricist- D.N.Madhok, MD- Gyan Dutt
Lyrics
dhak
dhak
dhak
dhak
dhak
dhak
dhak
dhak
dhak dhak
dhak dhak
nis din saanjh sawere
rahtee hai dil mein mere
dhak dhak
dhak dhak
nis din saanjh sawere
rahtee hai dil mein mere
o morey saajan(??)
dhak dhak se dilkee kehtee hai
o morey saajan(?? )
dhak dhak se dil kee kehtee hai
dhak dhak
dhak dhak
nis din saanjh sawere
rahtee hai dil mein mere
dhak dhak
dhak dhak
nis din saanjh sawere
rahtee hai dil mein mere
wo dil hee kya hai patthar hai
wo dil hee kya hai patthar hai
jis dil mein dard naheen hai
wo aashiq kya
jiska furkat mein
chehra zard naheen hai
wo aashiq kya
jiska furkat mein
chehra zard naheen hai
beshaq beshaq
dhak dhak
dhak dhak
dhak dhak
dhak dhak
nis din saanjh sawere
rahtee hai dil mein mere
tum phool bano main mool
unhoon
tum phool bano main mool
unhoon
tum koyal main ??
tum koyal main ??
unhoon unhoon
main dard banoon
aur tere chhote se dil pe chhaa jaaoon
main dard banoon
aur tere chhote se dil pe chhaa jaaoon
jaise main rota hoon sajnee
waise tujhe rulaaoon
jaise main rota hoon sajnee
waise tujhe rulaaoon
unhoon unhoon
jaise main rota hoon sajnee
waise tujhe rulaaoon
dhak dhak
dhak dhak
nis din saanjh sawere
o man mein pyaaree tere
dhak dhak
dhak dhak
nis din saanjh sawere
o man mein pyaaree tere
dhak dhak
dhak dhak
dhak dhak
dhak dhak
dhak dhak
dhak dhak
dhak dhak
Atul’s Song A Day- A choice collection of Hindi Film & Non-Film Songs 
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