‘Lata Mangeshkar Saved Us’: Two Pakistani Poets’ Tribute to the Icon

On the occasion of the late legend Lata Mangeshkar's 93rd birth anniversary (28 September), let's look back at Habib Jalib & Parveen Shakir’s moving dedication to music amidst incredibly trying times. Qafas mein mar chale the hum toa JalibBachaya humko aavaz-e-Lata ne(We were very much on our way to death in jailIt was Lata’s voice which saved us from the travail)So observed Pakistani poet Habib Jalib while being on death row in Pakistan’s notorious Mianwali jail – a jail that had once housed the likes of Nehru, Mujibur Rahman and Zulfikar Ali Bhutto – during Pakistan’s blackest days under the dictatorship of General Zia ul Haq.In an earlier period of incarceration at Hyderabad jail, Jalib wrote a fuller tribute to the music legend. As he recounts the circumstances of its revelation in his autobiography Jalib Beeti, Jalib’s jail comrades were also his friends. There were youth among them, too. They were his admirers. He would listen to them and they would listen to him. Sometimes, he would tell them, ‘Someone go find Lata [Mangeshkar].’ Lata Mangeshkar: Lover of Live Performances, My Connection to India There was a youth, Wahab, who was senior to them, and he, too, had good taste. Thus, two groups were formed there – one loved Lata, the other loved the Pakistani singer Naheed Akhtar. Jalib would say to them, “Brothers there is a big difference between Lata and Naheed.” Wahab, while rotating the needle on the radio, would scream where a song of Lata would be playing, “Jalib sahib! Lata has come, Lata has come.”Jalib wrote his tribute to Lata there. It begins and ends with the refrain:Tere madhur geeton ke sahareBeete hain din ren hamare Here is the translation of the whole poem:‘With the help of your charming songsOur days and nights passHad your voice not existedThe flame of life would have been extinguishedSuch are your true notesLike the sun, moon, starsWith the help of your charming songsOur days and nights passThe number of your songs is so manyThe heart bows when the instrument and the voice are in harmonyHearing you we become elatedThose like us who are afflictedWith the help of your charming songsOur days and nights passWithin you, Mira has come, residing permanentlyThe body and colour is the same verilyIn the universe, you have many a servantAs many as the stars on the firmamentWith the help of your charming songsOur days and nights pass.”Longer and more poetic than Jalib’s poem is Parveen Shakir’s free verse poem, Mushtarika Dushman ki Beti (Daughter of a Common Enemy), which was written under more sedate circumstances than Jalib’s verses. It forms part of Shakir’s bestselling debut poetic collection Khushboo (fragrance), published in 1976, when she was 24. Lata Mangeshkar: A Biographer Remembers the Maestro Behind the ‘Film Singer’Connoisseurs will also remember that 1976 was the year when Lata was at the peak of her singing career, having already sung in Mausam, directed by Gulzar in 1975 and giving the audience a hit song like Dil Dhoondta Hai; followed by hits like Husn Hazir Hai and Is Reshmi Paazeb ki Jhankaar (a duet with Mohammed Rafi) in the film Laila Majnu released in 1976. These achievements had come at the back of one of Lata’s finest musical moments, the release of the cult film Pakeezah in 1972, starring Meena Kumar and Ashok Kumar, and directed by Kamal Amrohi.Shakir’s poem then opens in a Chinese restaurant ostensibly outside the Indian subcontinent where the narrator and her colleagues are seated with their Indian interlocutors. The mood turns from pleasant to bitter with memories of the two wars both the subcontinental neighbours fought with each other in 1965 and 1971.It seemed to the poet that in such a tense situation, something will give way, but then:Lekin us pal aurkestra khamosh huaAur Lata ki ras tapkaati, shahad-aageen aavaz, kuch aise ubhriJese habs-zada kamre meinDarya ke rukh vaali khirki khulne lagi ho!Main ne dekhaJismon aur chehron ke tanaao parAn-dekhe haathon ki thandakPyaar ki shabnam chirak rahi thiMasakh-shuda chehre jese phir sanvar rahe theMeri nashanalist kaleegzHaathon ke pyalon mein apni thodiyaan rakheSaakit-o-jaamid bethi theenGeet ka jaadu bol raha tha!Mez ke neecheRestoraan ke maalik ki hans-mukh beevi keNarm gulabi paaon bhiGeet ki humraahi mein thirak rahe the!(But that moment, the orchestra became silentAnd the syrupy, honeyed voice of Lata, emerged suchAs if in a congested roomThe window facing the river is about to open!I sawUpon the tension of bodies and facesThe coolness of unseen handsWas sprinkling the dew of loveAs if the deformed faces were adorned againMy nationalist colleaguesKeeping their chins within the cups of (their) handsWere sitting quiet and stationaryThe magic of the song was rising!Under the tableThe soft rosy feet tooWere dancing to the accompaniment of the song!)For the honeyed voice of Lata, the eponymous “daughter of a common enemy” had intervened. Could it have been a song from the hit film Pakeezah? Like Mausam Hai Aashiqana or Chalo Dildar Chalo, which still must have been the rage despite the passage of four years and the heartbreakingly early death of its heroine Meena Kumari? Or some other Lata song? The poet does not tell us, but then a Lata song is a Lata song and here it acts as a palliative, calming nerves all around, as the poem races to its denouement, addressing its eminent subject:Mushtarika dushman ki betiMushtarika mehboob ki sooratUjle resham lehjon ki baanhen phailaayeHamen sameteNaach rahi thi!(The daughter of the common enemyIn the shape of the common loverExtending the arms of clean silk tonesGathering usWas dancing!’)Looking for Lata Mangeshkar: The Woman Behind the ‘Diva’Here is the whole poem:‘Inside a tiny Chinese restaurantMe and my nationalist colleaguesSitting within a beautiful sunset like the poems of KeatsWere looking at the aroma rising from the soup bowl, pleasing to the touchTurning into fulfillment of the bodyThe conversation sparkling with theMention of ‘The Wind Cannot Read’, Taj Mahal, Mysore silkAnd Benares sari turned up to Pak-Indian politics1965 – then 1971 – prisoners of warThe television of AmritsarPakistani culture – new battlefield – alarm bell…..My zealous colleaguesWere very angry at this attackI tried saying something, thenThey had frowned suchAs if they were given quinine syrup instead of soupThe jovial wife of the restaurateur tooWas looking at me with complaining glances(Perhaps some arrow of 1962 was still pierced within her heart!)In the nerves of the restaurant as ifRage like the body of a high-blood pressure person had enteredHad this condition lasted for some timeThen the arteries of our brains would have burstBut that moment, the orchestra became silentAnd the syrupy, honeyed voice of Lata, emerged suchAs if in a congested roomThe window facing the river is about to open!I sawUpon the tension of bodies and facesThe coolness of unseen handsWas sprinkling the dew of loveAs if the deformed faces were adorned againMy nationalist colleaguesKeeping their chins within the cups of (their) handsWere sitting quiet and stationaryThe magic of the song was rising!Under the tableThe soft rosy feet tooWere dancing to the accompaniment of the song!The daughter of the common enemyIn the shape of the common loverExtending the arms of clean silk tonesGathering usWas dancing!’It is indeed a remarkable tribute to the healing and uniting power of music that the nightingale of India could compel a people’s poet par excellence to provide a modicum of hope to people struggling for their rights, and provide catharsis to him while ensconced in a dictator’s jail. She also found mention in the maiden poetic collection of someone who would become a household name in Pakistan’s notoriously male-centric literary universe, becoming a peacemaker between warring neighbours even on foreign soil, albeit in a fictional setting.The power of the daughter of a common enemy indeed!(All the translations from the Urdu are by the writer.)(Raza Naeem is a Pakistani social scientist, book critic and award-winning translator and dramatic reader based in Lahore, where he is also the president of the Progressive Writers Association. This is an opinion article and the views expressed are the author's own. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for them.)

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‘Lata Mangeshkar Saved Us’: Two Pakistani Poets’ Tribute to the Icon

Habib Jalib & Parveen Shakir’s loving verses for the singer show how music can heal and unite people.

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