The legendary Annapurna Devi (16 April 1927–13 October 2018) nee Roshanara Khan, was a surbahar (bass sitar) player of Hindustani classical music. Named ‘Annapurna’ by former Maharaja
Brijnath Singh, she was born at Maihar, a small princely state of present Madhya Pradesh, India, where her father Allauddin Khan was a royal court musician, and founder of the Senia Maihar gharana of Hindustani classical music. Music had caused marital problems in her elder sister’s conservative in-law’s house, but Allaudin perceived that Annapoorna had a genuine interest in music, and her taalim began with vocal Dhrupad training, then the
sitar, and then shifted to the surbahar, a larger and more difficult cousin of the sitar, but ultimately a more rewarding instrument. Soon she even started guiding many of her father’s disciples, in classical music, as
well as in the techniques and intricacies of instrumental performances.
Aged 14, in 1941, converting to Hinduism, she married her father’s talented student, sitar maestro Ravi Shankar. Their only musician son, Shubhendra Shankar, died prematurely of contracted bronchial pneumonia in the U.S. on 15 September 1992. Ravi and Annapurna, in the 1950s performed duets in Delhi and Calcutta (Kolkata), principally at the college of her brother, Ali Akbar Khan.
Connoisseurs and music critics believe her to be a more gifted musician. Totally absorbed in her playing, eyes closed, she seemed totally cut off from the world. Shankar was ambitious and egocentric; and loved to shine alone in the sky and soon started getting insecure, suffering from an inferiority complex since she used to be applauded in concerts more than he was. This led to the discord in their marriage. But while she was so gifted, she also had a tremendous temper, like her father.
A puritan, Annapurna was allegedly enraged when she came to know of Ravi Shankar’s extra marital dalliances. Again, while she wanted to steadfastly stick to the music her father had taught her, her husband always looked for opportunities to experiment. Both were pinnacles of the two functions of music – as an inner doorway to divine joy, and as a medium of sharing divine joy with others.
Hrishikesh Mukherjee’s popular film Abhimaan, was based loosely on their marriage. To save her marriage, Annapurna Devi even vowed never to perform in public again, but eventually divorced him in 1962. Moving to Mumbai, Annapurna remained a recluse for most of her life, rarely stepping out of her residence. She stonewalled the media and was not photographed since 1956. A legend, she was more heard of, than heard. The tragedy is that her music was lost to the world. She never made a recording or socialised, but still monitored her select students in the drawing room, while she cooked and cleaned. Her determination to hold her vow, even after the marriage was lost, even after Shankar passed away, was a twisted way to deprive the world of her music, the unforgiving finger of blame pointing forever to Ravi Shankar.
In 1982, she married her student Rooshikumar Pandya, then 42, a management consultant, and a well-known communications expert, and a successful satirist in the United States. He died in 2013 of a cardiac arrest. Three decades of marriage to him seemed to have settled her, and healed long-held scars. She was the true Saraswati of Indian classical music, the Guru Maa – a combination of music teacher and spiritual guru to hundreds of students. She was unhappy at the declining standards in music, its lack of purity, the flight of excellence, all vanishing in favour of crowd-pleasing antics.
She was awarded the Padma Bhushan in 1977, and the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award in 1991. In 1999, she was conferred the Deshikottam, an honorary doctorate degree by the Visva-Bharati University. In 2004, SNA appointed her as the prestigious Ratna fellow in 2004. At 91 years, the doyenne of Hindustani classical music, died in Mumbai of respiratory infection, and other age-related problems.
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A.Radhakrishnan is a Pune based freelance writer, who dabbles in short stories and poems.
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