Bollywood lyricist didn’t meet son for 23 years, lived in mansion while he struggled in chawl: ‘Wore a Rs 10 shirt’

Lyricist Anjan had no idea that his son had ignored his warnings and boarded a train to Mumbai to make it in the film industry. He found out when the wife he'd ignored for decades wrote a letter to him.

Lyricist Anjan, with his son Sameer in the background. (Photo: Express Archive)

It is unusual for multiple generations of the same family to witness massive success, but in the film business, this is quite common. Lyricist Anjaan was on the verge of quitting the industry when he wrote the blockbuster song ‘Khaike Paan Banaras Waala,” and his fortunes turned overnight. But his struggle went on for nearly 20 years, and he didn’t want his son to experience the same difficulties. In fact, he warned him never to follow in his footsteps, even though they barely spoke to each other in over two decades. But his son, Sameer, was a rebel. He wanted to challenge life and his father, and so, at the age of 23, he took a train to Mumbai and began his own journey in the film industry. For months, he toiled away in poverty and despair, knowing that his father was living a lavish life in the same city. But he could never gather the courage to go meet him.

In an appearance on the Zindagi with Richa YouTube channel, he was asked why he continued to live in a chawl and use a shared washroom while his father lived in a bungalow in Juhu. He said, “My father struggled for nearly 20 years. And no father in this world would want their child to experience the same struggles that they did. I barely met him thrice when I was growing up. He would hardly come home. He was like a stranger to me. I remember once someone put me in his lap, and it felt odd, but also comforting. He would only give me one piece of advice. He’d tell me that I could do anything I wanted to, but I shouldn’t become a poet like him, and never try to join the film industry.”

Sameer continued, “It is impossible to survive as a lyrics writer in this industry. I was pretty good at studies, and I even worked at a bank for a while. But I just had to go to Mumbai, and when I made the decision, my family wept. They felt that they’d already lost one son, and now they were losing another. But I had a dream, and nobody could stop me. Destiny brought me to Mumbai, but I didn’t have the courage to go meet my father. I didn’t tell him.”

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Lyrics writer Sameer and Anjan. Express archive photo

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He was found out when he returned to his hometown of Varanasi in a tattered shirt, much to the shock of his mother. He said, “I bought a shirt for Rs 10. I slept hungry. I would ask myself why I did this. But every morning, I would begin afresh. The cycle would continue. I got work writing articles for a magazine, and I would fell like a king for Rs 500. But when my mother discovered how I was living, she wrote a letter to my father and scolded him for ignoring me. He told her that I hadn’t even bothered to meet him, and had been living secretly in Mumbai. He found out where I was living via relatives. I was 23 years old, and it was my first real meeting with my father.”

Sameer concluded. “He was left with no choice but to support me… But during that meeting, I had so much anger. I was determined to reject any help he’d give me. I challenged life to stop me.

In a recent interview with DD Urdu, he shed more light on his struggles in the industry, and said, “I have seen the hardest times in Mumbai. I was the same boy, who didn’t even have to take a glass of water by myself when I was back in Benaras. I didn’t know how to cook, just knew how to make tea. Biscuits were my breakfast. For lunch, I had a setting with an Uttar Pradesh man at a South Indian restaurant in Khar station. He would steal puris for me. I paid Rs 10 for lunch everyday. For dinners, if people ever invited me over then well and good, if not then would just eat a banana or so.”

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