Ae dil unhen bhoole se bhee ab yaad na karna
Posted on: September 19, 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 the 30th consecutive YIPPEE song. It is the last and final song from the comedy film Pagle-1950.
The film was made by Mercury productions, Bombay. It was directed by Pratima Dasgupta and the music was by V.G.Bhatkar aka Snehal Bhatkar. Since he was still working with H.M.V., he could not use his real name.
This was nothing new, because few other MDs also used Pseudo names to give music, for various reasons.
For example C. Ramchandra. It was from the film ‘Albela’ that C Ramchandra gave music to Bhagwan’s film in his real name. Prior to this, he gave music to his stunt films as ‘Annasaheb’ and Ram Chitalkar.
This type of use of pen names was followed by many MDs. GM Durrani gave music as Gunjan, SD Batish gave music as Nirmal Kumar. Snehal Bhatkar used several names like Vasudev, B Vasudev, VG Bhatkar and Snehal, before taking up another pen name Snehal Bhatkar for the rest of his career. Actually his name was Vasudeo and Snehal was his daughter’s name.
Similarly, MD Nashaad also used names like Shaukat Hussain Dehalvi, Shaukat Dehalvi, Shaukat Ali, and Shaukat Haider.
These are well known, but today I will tell you 2 pen names. Hardly anybody knows that Anil Biswas gave music to film ‘Begunah’ (1949) in the name of Haribhai. His co-MD in this film was Shyamu – none other than C Ramchandra. This information is given in the Encyclopedia of Indian Cinema by Rajadhyaksha on pages 67 and 190.
The Lyricists were Shehzad Lucknowi, Kabil Amritsari and Anjum Rehmani. For this film, HFGK neither credits any song to any lyricist nor any singers. Instead of the singer’s name it gives the name of actors who sang it on the screen. Thankfully Record numbers were given and from that we found out the real singers’ names.
The cast of this film included Begum Para, Madhuri, Jagirdar, Pratima Devi, Mubarak, David, Cuckoo and many others like Agha, Sherry etc. The film director Pratima Dasgupta started as an actress and then turned to be a Producer and Director. She was born on 5-9-1922 into a wealthy family of Bhavnagar, in Kathiawar state. Her father was the Chief Engineer of Kathiawar state. Her family was related to Rabindranath Tagore. So, after her initial education in England, she came to Shanti Niketan and completed her studies. She was a favourite and a favoured student throughout.
Looking at her acting skills, it was Tagore himself who recommended her to act in the Bangla film “Gora”-38, based on his own novel. Her role of Latika-daughter of Paresh babu in the film-who falls in Love with Bijoy and marries her- was liked by Tagore. She did one more film ‘Na hone wali baat’-38 in Hindi, followed by the Hindi version of Rukmini in 1939. After doing 4 Bangla films, she did the Trilingual film (Bangla, Hindi and English)- Raj nartaki-1941. This was made by Wadia movietone in Bombay and was directed by Modhu Bose, husband of the Heroine Sadhana Bose-the international dancer. She married Major Manzoor-ul- Huq, brother of actress Begum Para.
Her other Hindi films were Kunwara baap-42,Raja-43 and Shararat-44, all directed by Kishore Sahu. She also did Namaste in 1943.. After this she turned to Direction and did her first film Chhamiya-45, with Begum Para and David as a Lead pair. She repeated this team again in Pagle-50 also. However her second film ‘Jharna ‘-48 was banned by Morarji Desai, the then Chief Minister of Bombay Province, on the plea that the film had explicit sexual scenes in it. This was a financial disaster for Pratima and she decided to quit films.
In all, Pratima Dasgupta did 10 Hindi films and 8 Bangla films.
Some 13 years ago, I had written an article on the film’s Music Director Snehal Bhatkar, for ” Sangeet ke Sitare” and it was published on 27-8-2013. I am reproducing the article for our readers here…..
White full shirt, ironed white pyjama, spectacles with big powerful lenses and the trademark white Gandhi Topi… He could easily be mistaken for a ‘Pandharpur Warkari’ (a regular pilgrim to Pandharpur) or a member of a ‘Bhajani Mandali’ or simply a middle class ‘Marathi Manoos’. Such was the appearance of one of Hindi filmdom’s talented, yet not so famous, music maestro VASUDEV GANGARAM BHATKAR or Snehal Bhatkar, as we all know him.
In the Hindi film music field there were some talented composers like Ghulam Mohd, Mohd. Shafi, Iqbal Qureshi, Daan singh, C.Arjun, Ramlal, Sardar Malik, Ajit Merchant, Jamal Sen, Dattaram, Ganesh, etc. who could never reach the peaks of their careers. They really deserved success and fame, but luck did not favour them. Big banners never approached them and eventually the losers were the music lovers in India. These composers did not know, perhaps, how to sell their art. Maybe they never wanted to enslave music to gain name and fame, instead they preferred to settle for genuine service to music!
Snehal Bhatkar was one such composer. The maxim of simple living and high thinking never worked in this Mayanagari, but he had no regrets. Till the very end he was contented with whatever God gave him, and whatever name and success he achieved.
He was born into and grew up in a family that was surrounded by traditional devotional music all around. In the lower middle class, the people had their entertainments in singing Bhajans and doing Kirtans in Temples en masse.
Vasudev G. Bhatkar was born on 17-7-1919. He knew at least 100 bhajans by heart by the time he was in his 10th class. He was invited to sing in Ganesh Melas and other celebrations and soon became a well-known name in the locality. Because of his singing and skills in playing Harmonium and other instruments, he got a job with H.M.V. in Bombay. Here he used to give accompaniment on Harmonium to big classical singers. At the same time, taking cognizance of his singing skills, many Marathi bhavgeets and bhajans were recorded by HMV. Some of them are popular in Maharashtra even today.
All this while, Bhatkar was looking for an opportunity to compose in films. Sudhir Phadke who too served in HMV and recorded some songs from 1943 to 1945, joined hands with Bhatkar and made a pair-Vasudev-Sudhir. In 1946, they got a film by Baburao Painter – Rukmini Swayamvar – for music direction. The problem was that due to his service in HMV, he could not openly work outside. Hence he only gave his name as Vasudev. After this film, the pair separated and Phadke went to give music to films like Gokul, Aagey Badho, etc. Due to financial constraints Bhatkar was unable to leave his job with HMV.
In 1941, Bhatkar had come to know Kidar Sharma while recording songs for his film Chitralekha, which he was making for Ranjit Studios. Sharma had just come from Calcutta to establish himself in Bombay. He had a knack of identifying talents. He first gave a chance to Bhatkar to sing some songs with Leela Sawant in his film Kaliyan (1944). After Rukmini Swayamvar, Kidar Sharma gave him his first break as an independent composer in his Neelkamal (1947), where Kidar Sharma launched Raj Kapoor and Madhubala in adult roles as the leading pair. Bhatkar used the name B. Vasudev. In the subsequent years Bhatkar used different names for different films like V. G Bhatkar in Sant Tukaram (1948), Sati Ahalya (1949) and Pagle (1950), and Snehal in Suhaag Raat (1948) and Thes (1949). After doing Thes and Sati Ahalya, Bhatkar resigned from HMV.
Snehal Bhatkar and Kidar Sharma were very good friends. Kidar gave him Neki aur Badi in 1949. Meanwhile, Kidar Sharma met Roshan Lal Nagrath in some musical event. Sharma was terribly impressed with Roshan and wanted to give him a break in his film. At that point of time, Kidar had just started work on ‘Neki aur Badi’. He had a heart to heart talk with Bhatkar and Bhatkar gladly left the film for Roshan. Thus Roshan got his break with Neki aur Badi (1949). Roshan never forgot Bhatkar’s magnanimity in his life and always respected Bhatkar. In return Kidar Sharma gave Hamari Beti (1950) to Bhatkar. As he was a free bird now, Bhatkar started using the name SNEHAL BHATKAR from this film. Snehal was the short form of Snehalata, his daughter.
Snehal Bhatkar did many Marathi films and recorded many bhajans in Marathi, which are ever popular. He did 28 films in Hindi (including one unreleased film in the 50s) and 12 films in Marathi. Out of 27 released Hindi films, 9 were made by Kidar Sharma.
The song which made Mubarak Begum and Bhatkar famous in India was ‘Kabhi Tanhaiyon Mein, Hamari Yaad Aayegi’ from the film Hamari Yaad Aayegi (1961) (This film was originally named Jawan Muhabbat). Actually this song was to be done by Lata Mangeshkar. Lata had already recorded two songs for this film. Due to her extremely busy schedule she was unable to do this song, so she suggested the name of Asha Bhosle, but , already upset over Lata’s refusal, Kidar Sharma opted for Mubarak Begum and the rest, as they say, is History. She imbued a unique character to this song with her special voice.
After 1960, the musical scene in India was undergoing drastic changes and there was no space for composers like Bhatkar, who used a minimum orchestra and dwelt upon melody. His films came in long intervals. Even Kidar Sharma left him after Fariyad (1964) only to return in Pehla Qadam (1981). Finally Bhatkar did his last Hindi film Sahme Hue Sitare (1994),which featured his son Ramesh Bhatkar, who was already a popular hero in Marathi film, stage and TV. This obscure film did nothing good to Bhatkar.
After retirement Bhatkar devoted his time for children’s welfare and his original love-Bhajan Mandali singing.
Snehal or Vasudev Gangaram Bhatkar, together with cousins Devji Bhatkar and Panchambuwa Pandurang Shivalkar, was the founder member of ‘Vishwambhar Prasadik Bhajan Mandal’ in Dadar. It is still in operation after 50 years, with a new set of singers. Bhatkar was very kind hearted. Every year, during Ganapati festival he used to visit his ancestral village ‘Bhate’ in Ratnagiri district and participate in singing bhajans.
Lata, Talat and Mukesh were his favourite singers. Although Talat has not sung many songs for him, his song “Zindagi Kis Mod Pe Laayee Hamein” from Diwali Ki Raat (1956) was very popular. When rehearsals for this song were being done, Bhatkar had used only Tabla and Sitar for the practice session. The producer who chanced upon this rehearsal was so impressed with this that he insisted on recording the song only with minimum instruments. So, this song has only Tabla, Sitar and another instrument for accompaniment.
Though there were many melodious songs composed by Bhatkar like, Khusro’s ‘Lakhi Babul More Kaahe Ko Deenha Bides Re’ sung soulfully by Mukesh in Suhaag Raat (1948); ‘Ro-oge Pachhtaoge’ by Mukesh and Rajkumari in Thes (1949); Lata’s ‘Chanda Tumko Laaj Aa Aayee’ from Bhola Shankar (1951); Suman Kalyanpur’s ‘Haal-e-dil Unko Sunana Tha’- Fariyad (1964), except Kidar Sharma no other big banner producer opted for Snehal Bhatkar. Maybe his compositions were not so simple for a common man to hum or sing, although they were quality songs.
Despite several melodious songs Bhatkar was never counted amongst the first line composers. Kidar Sharma returned to him in 1980, but by that time Snehal Bhatkar was already on a descending tract.
SNEHAL BHATKAR, a talented but sadly not much applauded composer, died peacefully on 29-5-2007 at his Dadar home. He gave music to 28 Hindi films and sang in 8 films. He also gave music to 12 Marathi films.
Pagle (1950) was a classic black-and-white Hindi comedy film directed and produced by pioneering female filmmaker Protima Dasgupta.
While comprehensive scene-by-scene records of this rare film are limited due to its age, archival overviews describe it as a lighthearted romantic comedy of errors centering on the chaotic love story of a hotel manager and the daughter of a prominent politician.
Following their marriage, the two main characters find themselves separating over stubborn mutual differences and conflicting eccentricities. The narrative shifts into a series of comedic misunderstandings, driven by ego clashes and societal expectations, before ultimately finding a resolution. True to its title (Pagle meaning “crazy or mad people”), the film leans heavily into situational humor, showcasing the eccentric behaviors of its characters.
Here is the last and final song from this film, sung by Rajkumari. This makes the film YIPPEED !
Song- Ae dil unhen bhoole se bhee ab yaad na karna (Pagle)(1950) Singer- Raj Kumari, Lyricist- Not known, MD- V.G.Bhatkar aka Snehal Bhatkar
Lyrics :
Ae dilunhen bhoole se bhee
ab yaad na karna
ghut ghut ke mar jaana
magar fariyaad na karna
ghut ghut ke mar jaana
magar fariyaad na karna
ae dil
unhen bhoole se bhee
ab yaad na karna
pee jaana dil kee baat ko
gham ke aansuon ke saath
Ye zindagee hai
zindagee
haaye
barbaad na karna
ae dil
unhen bhoole se bhee
ab yaad na karna
itna karam karo
tumhen ulfat ka waastaa
is dil ko apnee yaad se
haaye
aabaad na karna
ae dil
unhen bhoole se bhee
ab yaad na karna
ujda chaman bahaar mein
barbaad aashiyaan
bigde huye naseeb kee
haaye
fariyaad na karna
ae dil
unhen bhoole se bhee
ab yaad na karna
wo zindagee ko ??
ulfat mein ??
ik khwaab thhaa
is khwaab ko
haaye
tum yaad na karna
ae dil
unhen bhoole se bhee
ab yaad na karna
ghut ghut ke mar jaana magar fariyaad na karna
Atul’s Song A Day- A choice collection of Hindi Film & Non-Film Songs 
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