Lata Mangeshkar once remarked “I believe in one power, and that is the hand of God.” For someone who held an unchallenged sway over music for over seven decades, she herself epitomised it and how.
He did his schooling from Sainik School Bhubaneswar, Odisha. His inclination towards the Armed Forces grew and the foundation of his future military life was laid. Shy and sober, yet firm in his resolve, he joined the school in 2007 and lived in Yamuna House. He loved gardening and enjoyed painting, solving Sudoku, poetry and playing hockey. He was a good orator too.
Born Hema Mangeshkar on 28 September 1929, she went on to become the Voice of the Millennium and Queen of Melody. For someone who recorded over 5600 songs in almost every Indian language – mostly Hindi, Marathi and Bengali — no one would have believed that a frail girl could get the kind of tonal gold out of her throat when she first set her footprint on the quick sands of film music.
Eldest among the four other siblings – Meena, Asha, Usha and Hridaynath — in a musically inclined Brahmin family, music came to her as inheritance from father Pt. Dinanath Mangeshkar, then himself an acclaimed classical singer and theatre artist. Her application and understanding of musical notes convinced her father of her musical credentials. At 5 she started performing in Sangeet Nataks (musical dramas).
When Dinanath dies after a protracted illness in 1942, the responsibility to run the family fell on Lata who then was barely 13. Help from Master Vinayak Karnataki (actress Nanda’s father) helped the family to make ends meet by offering her small roles in a movie company Navyug Chitrapat. She moved to Mumbai from Indore in 1945 and learnt classical music under the watchful tutelage of Ustad Aman Ali Khan. A song sung for ‘Aap Ki Sewa Mein’ (1946) and a couple of Bhajans brought her some limelight.
The first composer who saw the immense powerhouse of her talent was Ghulam Haider who prophesised that a day would come when producers and directors would fall at her feet and beg her to sing for them. He gave her, her first major break and hit with ‘Dil Mera Toda, Mujhe Kahin Ka Na Chhoda’ (Majboor 1948). In an interview on her 84th birthday in 2013 she declared Ghulam Haider was her true Godfather.
Lata then ostensibly carried the influence of beauty queen-singer Noorjehan who later migrated to Pakistan to leave the field clear for her. She dropped her nasal tone in her voice to establish a soprano range with just the right amplitude.
She worked hard on her Urdu diction after a jibe by became part of national consciousness. A year earlier, it was courtesy Shankar-Jaikishen that she hit pop charts with RK’s Barsaat.
It was the beginning of a marathon and colossal career that took her from strength to strength with one coveted award after another. She worked with all first line composers like Ghulam Haider, Ghulam Mohammed, Husnlal Bhagatram, Shyamsunder Naushad, Sajjad Hussein, Hansraj Behl, Salil Choudhury, SD Burman, Madan Mohan, C Ramchandra, Anil Biswas, Khayyam, Sudhir Phadke, Shankar- Jaikishen and second line ones like Chitragupt, Sardar Malik, RD Burman, Jaidev, Hemant Kumar, Bulo C Rani, SN Tripathi, N Dutta Usha Khanna, Kalyanji-Anandji and LaxmikantPyarelal. The run continued until AR Rehman. The journey continued for decades until she decided to hang boots with Veer Zara in 2001. There was no frontier left for her to conquer and nothing to prove to anyone.
It is well neigh impossible to single out the gems – classical, light, bhaavgeets from her mind boggling repertoire and oeuvre — she sang but ‘Ae mere watan ke logo’ a private song composed by C Ramchandra became the country’s signature patriotic song. It was mainly because of her that singers got recognition to be mentioned on records. By early 60s she was a major force and that also got her into several controversies and tiffs that included her alleged “monopolising” but ended in happy patch-ups. In her sojourn she delivered packed concerts across the world. She sang with virtually every male and female singer, her duets with Mohammed Rafi a rage.
The awards that she won – prominently the Bharat Ratna (2001), Dadasaheb Phalke Award (1989), National and Filmfare awards and civilian awards from other countries are far too many to be encapsulated in words. Alongside, she did charity by setting up a hospital in Pune.
Confined to home in the last 20 years, she contracted Covid and after a 28-day battle, the Guinness record holder succumbed to it. The Government announced a two-day national morning. Her funeral was attended by Prime Minister Narendra Modi among of a host of who’s who.