In a song I love for its blend of indescribably beautiful lyrics and soulful tune, Dharmendra appears in a memory, mixed with nostalgic sunlight filtering in through windowless chinks of an ancient, abandoned fortress. It is from the 1977 film Kinara directed by Gulzar and stars Dharmendra as an archaeology professor who dies in a car accident; Hema Malini, a dancer who loves him; and Jeetendra who comes into their live s inadvertently.
As the camera pans over vast expanses of the surrounding ruins, we hear the words “naam ghoom jayega/chehera yeh badal jayega/meri awaaz hi pehchan hain/gar yaad rahen,” as though emanating from the depths of an unknown realm from the past. While it is sung by the character of Hema Malini if I were to critique the film, I would urge the director to use the song as voiceover to the images to heighten its quality of extraordinary spirituality.
Though the lyrics, by Gulzar himself, defies translation, here is what the words more or less mean in English: “Our names will be lost in the oblivion of time/our appearances will change/only the sound of my voice will remain as my identity/it is this that you will remember well.” Music composer R.D. Burman’s tunes elevate the lyrics to the level of the divine. It is a paradox that this song, about transience, is indelibly imprinted in our hearts and minds, like a lasting memory. When Dharmendra died and people paid their tributes, I actually expected to hear radio stations and television channels play this song in a loop.
As they did when “queen of melody”, Lata Mangeshkar, who sang this song in her mesmerizingly mellifluous voice, died. (Bhupinder Singh was the male voice in the song and was lip-synched by Jeetendra. I think their parts added a dimension – a kind of loneliness-laced solidarity, symbolizing perhaps the character they essayed.) That’s probably because Dharmendra is better known for his other roles and quite justifiably so perhaps. Who would forget his laugh-riot performance doing a driver act in the 1975 film Chupke Chupke? Yet to me the theme of the ephemeral nature of existence that is captured in “naam goom jagega/chehera yeh badal jayega” and his ever-so- brief portrayal of this existential idea is the everlasting image of him.
Dharmendra is known to have been the “handsomest” actor in Hindi cinema. Interestingly that’s the first thing I hear people say about him, men or women. Well, I have never met him but when I asked my sister Mandira, who is an alumna of the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII), Pune whether she has ever seen Dharmendra, she said, “Yes, when he came to our campus. He was extremely handsome and in an unassuming kind of way. He was dressed very casually. I don’t exactly remember what he was wearing but I think it was a half-sleeved bush-shirt and pants and possibly rubber slippers. My husband was there too and even he was really impressed.” She laughs.
The song continues with Dharmendra, appearing in memory, singing “Deen dhaley jahaan/raat paas ho.” When the day descends/night must be nearby. Speaking of night and while still on the topic of films, I absolutely HAVE to mention a new movie I watched Friday night. The Bengali film “Haati Haati Pa Pa” directed by Arnab Kumar Middya and starring Chiranjeet and Rukmini Maitra is about a daughter who does not want to leave her father alone and refuses to get married. Her understanding f iancé, who live s in L ondon, notwithstanding “Pa Pa” as the daughter calls her Dad, devises devious means of getting the daughter to see reason and get a life. The topic is so refreshingly real and addresses such a heart-wrenching, modern-day social reality, that it reverberated with everyone.
The emotional-connect was so profound I found a hall full of people in various states of tear-shedding. While I caught glimpses of a few wiping their eyes with tissues or handkerchiefs, others were actually weeping. Me? Well, you know. The story is by Priyanka Poddar who said that it was sort of based on personal experience….she herself did not want to leave her mother alone to get married and go away. Though the theme is deep and “heavy”, the treatment is “light” with generous doses of humor.
There is an element of the “saga” with the protagonist, the daughter, seeing in her own life with her child, the reflections of her own childhood. She and her parents during the days of “haati haati pa pa” which all Bengalis know as the days when a toddler transitions from crawling into taking the first baby steps of walking into life. The film is able to focus the lens of life’s duality of deep transience with mundane realities. What else is life but the blend of both? As the song goes, “aaj hain yahan/kaal kahin nahin”. Here today but nowhere tomorrow. The writer is Editor, Features