Duniya hai ye pyaar kee duniya
Posted on: June 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.
| Blog Day : | 6533 | Post No. : | 20322 |
Today’s song is from a Social film – Parakh-1944.
Made by Central Studios, Bombay the film was directed by Sohrab Modi. The music was by 2 MDs – Khursheed Anwar (7 songs) and Saraswati Devi (2 songs). The cast ofthe film included Mehtab, Balwant Singh, Kaushalya, Shahnawaz, Yakub, Sadiq Ali, Pratima Devi, Balraj Mehta and some others.
In recent times, in India, the women are better treated, respected and also honoured for their contribution to running the household as well as earning equally to manage the married life on level fields. Women can be seen practically in every field of activity and have reached the top of the work places in almost every sphere. We have seen them as President, Prime Minister of the country, In Judiciary, Banks and even in Armed forces-be it Army, Navy or Air Force, the police, sports etc. There is hardly any field where women have not put their stamp.
But if you go back in the last 100 years, the conditions were different. Women were not so much independent and in an industry like Film Line, women who joined it would be seen in a very bad light. First of all, getting women to work in films was a Herculean task. The actual, real women who worked in a film was in 1913, when Durgabai kaqmat and her daughter worked in a silent film ” Bhasmasur Mohini”. Till then and even after that for some more time, women’s roles were done by good looking young actors in stage dramas and films. As the years passed by, slowly girls started joining films – first the Jews, European and Anglo-Indians and then came girls from singing families (read Tawaifs), before girls from educated and respected families joined films.
By the 30’s and the 40’s there were enough women in films.However, most of them were controlled by their nearest kins like parents (Madhubala’s father and Suraiya’s grandmother) or brothers/sisters (Baburao Apte for Shanta Apte and Sardar Akhtar for Bahar). Many actresses, after their marriage, were prohibited from acting in films by their husbands or in-laws, so they quit films. Some examples are – the first heroine of Talkie films, Zubeida Sr. and also Zubeida Jr. in later times, Monika Desai, Latika, Mohana, Shahzadi-both Sr. and jr. etc. Those who continued after marriage followed restrictions put by the Husbands. For example, Mumtaz Shanti had to always remain in a Burkha, except actual shooting. She was not allowed to talk to anyone on the set and had to immediately return home after shootings. Her husband, Lyricist, producer and Director Wali Saheb was a very orthodox Muslim. As long as Shamshad Begum’s father was alive she was not allowed to have her Photo taken by anyone.
Another example was Shanta Apte. When she joined films, her brother Baburao Apte used to hover around constantly during her shoots to prevent her mixing with others. What’s more, she was not allowed to work with anyone as her husband in the films, except only her brother Baburao- who would do the role of her husband.Only after Baburao’s marriage, Shanta Apte became ‘Free’.
In this connection there are some more examples. For the heroine Pushpa Huns, the film Apna Desh-1949 was her Debut film in Hindi. She had already done a Punjabi film – Chaman-1948. Before marriage she was Pushpa Kapoor. After she married Major Hunsraj Chpda, she became Pushpa Chopda. For the film world, she chose a novel name. She took Huns from husband’s name and called herself Pushpa Huns. When her husband was transferred from Delhi to Bombay, she got an opportunity to work in films and sing, as she had a regular training in singing. Since the families of both , the Husband and Wife were in Delhi, there was no resistance from them. Major Chopda too considered films as her hobby and allowed her.
After just 3 films and 14 songs – Apna Desh-1949, Sheesh Mahal-1950 and Kaale Baadal-1951, her film career had to be abandoned when her husband was transferred back to Delhi. Pushpa Huns came to films only after her marriage. There were many such cases in the Hindi film Industry from the beginning. Actresses like Durga khote, Leela Chitnis, Meenakshi Shirodkar, Leela Mishra, Nirupa Roy etc. joined films only after their marriage. As the time passed and women became more independent, a trend came to start work before getting married. Even during the later periods, after the actresses got married, only a few continued working in films. Some worked for a short time after marriage and some worked for a longer time.
Then there is the case of Meera Mishra. She was the wife of an I.P.S. officer. Selected by Bombay Talkies for 2 versions of a film – in Bangla and Hindi (Milan-1946), she did the role of kamla in both versions, opposite Dilip Kumar and Pahadi Sanyal. After these films, her husband forced her to quit films. However , her husband died in action during Delhi riots and she continued films. After 5 Bangla and 7 Hindi films, she got married again and her new husband also forced her to quit films forever !
The case of singer Desai sisters – Promodini and Vinodini went the same way. There are many such cases for actresses too. For example, Baby Shakuntala, Baby Vimal, Manju (wife of Karan Dewan), Vasanti etc. After reading about their abruptly quitting films, one starts searching for an answer for the question…. ” were they simply unfortunate or victims of the Male Dominated Indian Culture ? “
There are some pathetic stories of artists who were forced to quit their film career by their husbands. The most heart touching case is that of today’s singer Ira Nigam. IRA NIGAM (NOT Ira Nagrath-wife of Roshan.She was a different person) was born in October 1930 in Seoni(M.P.) in her mother’s Mayaka.
She had a God given gift of singing. She was educated in Delhi and Shantiniketan.Her father Hriday Narayan Nigam was a singer himself.With his help she started singing on AIR Delhi. She completed her graduation in Music form DU.
Her voice was sweet and melodious. Roshan,who was also working in AIR Delhi,one day brought the famous composer Khurshid Anwar to her house.They convinced her father to allow her to sing in films.She was so lucky to sing her first song in PARAKH-1944,under the baton of Khurshid Anwar.She was only 14 years old the.Here her father put a condition that only he will sing duets with her and no other male. In an unique case, the father and daughter sang a love duet in the film Parakh-1944. Due to this strange condition , she got only one more film Asmat-44 and they had to go back to Delhi.
Ira got married in the meantime and came back to Bombay again in 1948. This time with her husband P.N.Nigam.
Harmandir Hamraz, who interviewed her in Kanpur in Aug 1984 says that she wept when she told him that as her Husband did not like her work in Hindi Films,she had to give up singing after doing just 5 more films (total 7 films).
She sang in Rakhi-49,Char Din-49,Ek teri Nishani-49,Veer Ghatotkach-49 and the last film Guru Dakshina-50. There were hundreds of singing offers to her when she left Bombay a second time.First it was due to Father and next it was due to Husband,who cut short a melodious singing career.
One of the cast members is Balwant Singh. He was born in Pandoga village of Hoshiarpur on 9-12-1918 in a Jahagirdar’s family. He was quite rich. After training from Pt. Bhishmadev in classical music,he came to Bombay and joined Bombay Talkies at the age of 18 years.He first gave Playback in Jeevan Prabhat-37.In Nirmala-38 he acted and also sang a song.Then came Durga-39 where also he acted and sang. V.Shantaram cast him in Padosi-41 and his songs in this film were hits.
He was Hero in Darpan (1941),Swapna (1942),Malan (1943),Naukar (1943),Paraya Dhan (1943),Ashirwaad (1943),Collegian (1944),Dr.Kumar (1944),Bhanwar (1947,Hip hip hurray (1948) and Apni chhaya-(1950) etc. As a hero he sang less songs. His songs with Shanta Hublikar(Malan) and Parul Ghosh and Khan Mastana (Bhanwar) were very popular. He also acted in Nirmala, Vachan and Kangan.
In all, he acted in 18 films, sang 20 songs in 10 films and also wrote 6 songs in the film Sumitra-1949.
He married a girl from the royal family of Palanpur, Gujrat. After leaving films, he worked in All India Radio for 4 years. After he retired, it was claimed that it was Balwant Singh who created the famous Signature Tune of All India Radio. However,it was never proved and the credit went to Walter Kauffman for the tune.Then he settled in Ahmedabad, directing Dramas and Teaching music. Finally, he shifted to Ludhiana where, after a long illness, he died on 4-12-1985.
Here is a song from the film Parakh-1944, sung by Ira Nigam. Enjoy…..
Song- Duniya hai yeh Pyaar kee duniya (Parakh)(1944) Singer- Ira Nigam, Lyricist- Gafil Harinalvi, MD-Khursheed Anwar
Lyrics
Duniya hai yeh Pyaar kee duniya
Duniya hai yeh Pyaar kee funiya
ho jaane waale
pyaar kiye jaa aa
jeewan saathhee yahee hai tera
pyaar ko saath liye jaa aa
ho jaane waale
pyaar ko saath liye jaa
pyaar kee duniya badee suhaanee ee
khel raha hai aag se paanee ee
pyaar kee duniya badee suhaanee ee
khel raha hai aag se paanee ee
dushman ko bhee ee galey lagaa kee ae
hai insaan kiye jaa
duniya hai ye pyaar kee duniya
ho jaane waale
pyaar kiye jaa aa
jeewan saathhee yahee hai tera
pyaar ko saath liye jaa aa
ho jaane waale
pyaar ko saath liye jaa
sukh dukh donon pyaar ke pyaale ae
hanste hanste ae pee matwaale
pee matwaale
sukh dukh donon pyaar ke pyaale ae
hanste hanste ae pee matwaale
pee matwaale
jhoom jhoom kar
ek saans mein aen
donon jaam piye jaa aa
duniya hai ye pyaar kee duniya
ho jaane waale
pyaar kiye jaa aa
jeewan saathhee yahee hai tera
pyaar ko saath liye jaa aa
ho jaane waale
pyaar ko saath liye jaa
2 Responses to "Duniya hai ye pyaar kee duniya"
June 7, 2026 at 9:05 am
Arun ji
Thanks for the post covering the plight women (in those days) who wanted to enter(or having entered, to continue working in) the film industry, either as actresses or singers. Certainly women of current generation have a more freedom to try their hand, or to fulfil their ambition
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Atul’s Song A Day- A choice collection of Hindi Film & Non-Film Songs 
June 7, 2026 at 9:05 am
Arun ji
Thanks for the post covering the plight women (in those days) who wanted to enter(or having entered, to continue working in) the film industry, either as actresses or singers. Certainly women of current generation have a more freedom to try their hand, or to fulfil their ambition
LikeLike