When Lata got a ‘maulana’ to teach her Urdu after Dilip Kumar’s remark

How did a Marathi speaking singer not conversant with Urdu perfect her diction in the language The answer goes back to 1947 when Lata Mangeshkar met Dilip Kumar for the first time and he expressed doubts over her pronunciation prompting her to get lessons from a maulanaMangeshkar who died on Sunday in a Mumbai hospital recalls her experiments with Urdu in Kumarrsquos autobiography ldquoThe Substance and the Shadowrdquo and said Kumar gave her a gift ldquounknowingly and unhesitatinglyrdquo in their first meeting itselfShe was introduced to the legendary actor by noted composer Anil Biswas on a local train Recounting the meeting sometime in 1947 Mangeshkar wrote that Biswas introduced her to Kumar saying ldquoLata hai bahut achcha gaati hai This is Lata she sings very wellrdquo To which Kumar replied ldquoAchcha kahan ki hairsquo OK Where is she fromrdquo and Biswas gave her full name Lata MangeshkarldquoThe remark that Yousuf Bhai made when he found out that I am a Maharashtrian is something that I cherish because it made me seek the perfection I then lacked in my Hindi and Urdu diction He said very truthfully that singers who were not conversant with the Urdu language invariably tripped in the pronunciation of words derived from the language and that jarred and spoiled the listening pleasure for those who enjoyed the lyric as much as the melodyrdquo Mangeshkar said in the bookAt first she said it saddened her that he thought she had a flaw in her rendering ldquoThen I thought over the remark and I realized he was right and he had said it with the intention of improving my diction if it needed the improvementrdquo Mangeshkar said she went home and sent for a family friend who was an Urdu expert to come over urgently as she wished to take lessons in Urdu immediately ldquoA learned maulana was arranged by Shafi Imam our family friend who was like an elder brother to me As I continued my Urdu lessons I found myself being appreciated and admired more and morerdquo the legendary singer saidThe result of that first meeting and the lessons that followed were priceless pieces of musical legacy in Urdu including ldquoPyaar kiya toh darna kyardquo and ldquoBekas pe karamrdquo ldquoMughaleAzamrdquo and ldquoMausam hai aashiqanardquo ldquoPakeezahrdquoMangeshkar went on sing thousands of songs in as many as 36 Indian languages in her almost eightdecade careerIn the book Mangeshkar also recounted how she never missed an opportunity to call on Kumar who she said was like an elder brotherldquoWe did not meet too often those days However whenever there was a recording of a song at Mehboob Studios and Yousuf Bhai was shooting there I never missed the opportunity to call on him He was a superstar and I was rising on the horizon as a playback singer but when we met he held me close to his heart like an elder brother and gave me the love and respect that only someone as pure as he couldrdquo she saidRecounting another incident highlighting their affection Mangeshkar wrote that during an evening at composer Kalyanjirsquos home a plate of paan betel leaves arrived after snacks ldquoWhen I took the liberty of telling Yousuf Bhai to have a paan his expression changed to a frown He said lsquoIt is not proper for you to do this Never do it in futurersquo I was taken aback because at that time I had no idea that it was not appropriate for a decent lady to offer a paan to a manrdquo she saidMangeshkar the voice of generations of Indians and one of the biggest music icons of the country died Sunday due to multiple organ failure her sister Usha Mangeshkar and doctors treating her said She was 92This story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever