Chhaayaageet #92 - “For your sake I am willing to sing for these people.”

The filmmaker picks up the newspaper. An obscure story catches his eye. He cannot shake the story off his mind. He discusses it with his wife and his script writer. Together they build a story around the short paragraph in the newspaper. The filmmaker decides this would be the first film of his own production banner. For close to 20 years he has been directing films for other producers. Now it is time to produce his own film.

A multi-starrer star cast is assembled. The filmmaker knows he is embarking on an ambitious project. He wants his favorite singer to be the primary playback singer. Therein lies the problem. The film industry is a rollercoaster. One can find oneself adored one moment, and the next moment one can be without work. For those who just want to avoid all the politics and can’t play the games, it can be a ruthless place.

In recent times, the filmmaker’s arm had been twisted by producers and others to replace his favorite singer with another. For a period of three to four years, his favorite singer had not had much work come his way. It seems as if the industry has moved on from him.

Now that the filmmaker is making the film under his own production house, he is adamant. The filmmaker says to his composers, “I want only him to sing my songs, and no one else.”

The composers are hesitant. They ask the filmmaker, “Do you think he will agree to sing for us?”

There is only one way to find out. The filmmaker goes to the singer’s house. For him it is like a devotee going to the temple. This man’s voice is the voice of God.

The singer receives him with utmost respect, and asks, “Yes, what can I do for you?”

“Saab, this is my first film. I am coming up in a big way. Would you please sing for me?”, the filmmaker puts forward his plea with folded hands.

The singer takes the filmmaker’s hands in his own. “Manmohan, for your sake I am willing to sing for these people, otherwise, I would never sing for them.”

Manmohan Desai insisted that Mohammad Rafi be the lead singer of his maiden production and blockbuster Amar Akbar Anthony (1977), music by Laxmikant Pyarelal, lyrics by Anand Bakshi. This film became the comeback vehicle of Rafi Saab, after which he did not look back again.

Laxmikant Pyarelal’s music and songs and the film became popular and are cult classics to this day. During the making of the song, Desai wanted one line, “Akbar tera naam nahin hai” of each antara to be sung by Amitabh Bachchan on screen, who is in the audience. This was highly unusual, but perhaps not so much keeping in line with other aspects that defied logic. It is said that Kishore Kumar was approached to sing this one line a couple of times, but Kishore da quoted an exorbitant amount. He suggested Amit Kumar in his place. Amit Kumar had just come on to the scene in 1976 with Bade achchhe lagte hain. On the day of the recording, Laxmiji picked up Amit Kumar in his car and took him to the Tardeo Recording Studio, and he got to sing one line with the great Rafi Saab. After this film, Rafi Saab was cemented as the playback voice for Rishi Kapoor with many memorable songs together.

Desai saw an article in the newspaper about a man who after being frustrated at being unable to feed his family, had left his three children in a park and given up his life. Desai kept thinking about this and wondered what could drive a man to do this, what might happen to his three children. He built the story around this and combined plot points of lost & found, secularism and faith, along with making it a musical. The film was criticized unsparingly by film critics and the press. Even during the making of the film, the artists would make fun of the illogical sequences, but Manmohan Desai stuck to his guns and proved everyone wrong. It fared extremely well at the box office becoming the highest grossing film of the year. In Bombay, the film ran housefull for 25 weeks in 9 different cinemas, a record.

Anand Bakshi and Mohammad Rafi were respectively nominated for Best Lyricist and Best Male Playback Singer Filmfare awards for the song Parda hai parda. Manmohan Desai was nominated for Best Director. Amitabh Bachchan won his first Filmfare award for Best Actor. Laxmikant Pyarelal won the Filmfare award for Best Music Director. Kamlakar Karkhanis won the award for Best Editing.

This was Amitabh’s first film with Manmohan Desai. After seeing Amitabh perform the mirror scene, Desai vowed to only make films with him. In many of Desai’s films, Mohammad Rafi is seen giving playback for Amitabh, even when in other Amitabh films, his songs were sung by Kishore Kumar. It is said that in Manmohan Desai’s temple at home, he had a photo of Mohammad Rafi besides other deities. After all his voice was regarded as the voice of God.

Parda hai parda ranked at #2 on 1977’s Binaca Geetmala.

Watch Rafi Saab performing this song live at a concert.

Singer: Mohammad Rafi, Amit Kumar
Lyrics: Anand Bakshi
Music: Laxmikant Pyarelal
*ing: Rishi Kapoor, Neetu Singh, Amitabh Bachchan
Director: Manmohan Desai
Film: Amar Akbar Anthony (1977)