If the previous post was any inspiration (with limited but encouraging comments), I once again venture down memory lane (am I sounding ancient??) and look back rather hear the now distant melodies which the heart can’t help but remember fondly during the bits of solitude which I try to snatch once in a while.
The first ones which meanders through my mind are the popular chartbusters of hindi film songs of yesteryears. During the summer months these used to blare from the ‘Ahuja’ loudspeaker systems at the marriage mandaps in the small town where I grew up. Songs by Rafi, Kishore and Lata from movies like Don, Muqaddar ka Sikandar and Sholay echoed into the night and the ears of schoolgoing Sanjoy heard them with wilfull distraction straying away from the chapters I had to read or the homework to be completed. Once the exams got over, sleeping on the terrace, enjoying the cool breeze, me and my brother had a merry time making guesses as to which song would be next.
On those Sundays while waiting my turn at the neighbourhood barber shop I listened to similar songs on the radio tuned to Radio Ceylone or Vividh Bharti interrupted by the quintessential news bulletins. The host/hostess of the radio programs used to list out the ‘farmaish karne wale’ people and the details of the songs to include singer, lyricist, composer etc etc. So names like Majrooh Sultanpuri, Shailender, Anand Bakshi and Kalyandji Anandji became quite familiar.
During the ten day long ‘Ganapati’ festival days almost all the Ganapati mandals used to play the ‘Ganesh vandana’ by Lata Mangeshkar early in the morning. This is such a sweet and melodious rendition by the singer that it pleases your senses no end even though the language is marathi.
Certain songs are associated with occasion and happenings. One which instantly comes to my mind is ‘Mil jayein is tarah, do lehrein jis tarah…phir na hona juda, ab yeh wada raha’….I don’t know who the singer, composer are or which in movie it was featured, but the time and place when I heard the song makes it very dear and memorable. The year was 1979 and I was going to Elephanta caves on a motorlaunch from Gateway of India, Bombay along with family and relatives. It was a Sunday and the air was indeed festive. All around were Bombayites wearing shiny polyster fabrics (the rage of seventies), men having brylcreemed hair and smelling of Old Spice aftershave, women wore broadframed whiterimmed sunglasses (goggles as they were termed) and smiled and laughed with gay abandon (I think they do much less these days). While I and my cousins shuttled back and forth amongst bellbottomed legs to see the waves splash on the bow or watch the froth in the wake from the stern, this song played on the deck along with the distinct hum of the boat engine will remain etched forever as a memoir of that travel.
Cut to 1991, I was doing my basic Young Officer's course. Dripping wet in the Pune rain we went to watch 'Dil hai ki maanta nahi' and came back on motorbikes humming the title song all the way to the campus. Came 1993 and I was deployed in south Kashmir. Terrorism had just peaked and the air was rife with anticipation of mishappenings. Incidents of terror strikes, encounters, cordon and search were order of the day..and nights too. Sitting inside a fortified camp bleary eyed and weary after a patrol in the freezing previous night, sipping hot cups of tea next to a roaring ‘bukhari’ listening to ‘Dil hoon hoon karein, ghabraye…’ from a newly acquired cassette of Rudali is another memory which won’t fade away easily.
Staying awake late in the night listening to Jagjit's 'Woh kagaz ki kashti, woh barish ka pani..' or Pink Floyyd's 'Brick in the wall' , dimming the lights and hearing Eagles's 'Hotel California' again and again on a friend's newly assembled music supersystem (advanced acoustics as he would explain to us) are some of the memorable musical interludes which makes me pause and smile involuntarily. Also making me believe..Yup! it's not a bad life after all.
