Meena Shorey in Gulfarosh (1961)

Meena Shorey can be considered as the Liz Taylor of Bollywood or Lollywood as far as marriages are concerned. Her long list of Indian and Pakistani husbands include Raza Mir, Al-Nasir, Roop K Shorey, Zahoor Raja and Asad Bokhari. However, when she died in 1989 none of them was present at her funeral and her burial expenses were paid with charity money. In this video, besides Meena, other Bollywood veterans Himalayawala and Zahoor Raja can also be seen. Singer is Zubaida Khanum, music director is Tassaduq Hussain.

Cuckoo and Helen in Yahudi (1958)

Using multiple playback singers for same person in the same film was a common practice in Hindi films. For example, in Tamasha (1952) Meena Kumari got playback from Geeta Dutt, Asha Bhosle and Lata Mangeshkar. I can understand the reasons behind that practice.  Perhaps producers wanted to include as many playback singers of repute as they could in the film to sell their final product OR Perhaps the music director composed the song by keeping particular playback singer in mind. But what I don’t understand is why in some songs they interchanged playback singers in the same song on same person when 2 playback singers were supposed to sing for 2 different people. That could only be blamed on poor direction. Here are some songs which enforce my point -

1.  In this song from Do Ustad (1959), Shamshad Begum is supposed to sing for Bimla Kumari and Asha Bhosle for Madhubala. But in the beginning, Bimla starts with Shamshad voice, switches to Asha’s voice momentarily and then back to Shamshad’s voice -

2. In this song from Yahudi (1958), Geeta and Lata’s voice keeps on interchanging for Cuckoo and Helen -

3. In this song from Mother India (1957), Nargis gets playback from Shamshad and Lata and Raj Kumar gets playback from Rafi and Manna Dey (Carefully watch this video at 0:55 seconds). Same goes for Kum Kum and Rajendra Kumar -

Mubarak Begum with Music Director Feroze Nizami - Picture courtesy of Irfan Anwar and Surjit Singh

Note – Irfan dates this picture to 1946-1947. I don’t think that is correct because Mubarak first film song was for Yakub’s Aiye released in 1949. I think this photo is possibly from late 50s when she visited Lahore.

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Indian playback singer Mubarak Begum (Kabhi tanhaiyoun mein fame) sang few songs for Pakistani films during her visit to Pakistan in late 50s.  Four songs for Raaz (Starring – Mussarat Nazir, Ejaz Durrani and Shamim Ara) and one song for Bada Aadmi (Starring – Ejaz Durrani and Meena Shorey).

Songs of Raaz (1959) were sung by Zubaida Khanum, Ahmed Rushdi and Mubarak Begum. Many youtube users are incorrectly tagging the songs attributing Zubaida’s songs to Mubarak and vice versa. Even EMI made this error and incorrectly included Mubarak Begum’s “Mast nazar” in Zubaida Khanum’s CD. Here is the correct list of who sang what :-

1. Mast nazar mori patli qamar – Mubarak Begum

2. Meethi meethi batiyoun sai jiya na jala – Zubaida Khanum

3. Ha hola hola hola – Mubarak Begum

4. Maan maan maan zamana hai jawan – Mubarak Begum and Ahmed Rushdi

5. Chal na sakey gi 420 – Ahmed Rushdi

6. Chhalak rahi hain mastiyan – Zubaida Khanum and Ahmed Rushdi

7. Qissa e gham sunaein kiya – Mubarak Begum

Mubarak Begum also sang a duet with Ahmed Rushdi Kahe jalana dil ko in Bada Aadmi (1957), music by Ghulam Nabi and Abdul Latif. Although songs of Raaz are easily available on youtube, Mubarak’s duet from Bada Aadmi is hard to get hold of. It might be available with few collectors.

Mubarak Begum’s songs in Raaz

Mast nazar – Picturized on Shamim Ara – The less said about Shamim’s dancing skills the better.

Maan maan maan zamana hai jawaan – Picturized on Shamim Ara and ?

Qisa-e-gham sunaein kiya – Picturized on Mussarat Nazir

Ha hola hola hola ha hola – Picturized on Shamim Ara