The Unsung Begum

“It’s hard to let go of people you’ve spent so much time recording and rehearsing. Mubarak will remain one of the more humble and cooperative singers I worked with. I wanted a certain amount of rehearsals before the singers could sing finally in the studio. The best thing about her was that she would rehearse as many times as the composer needed, without any sweat on her brow. She would smile and deliver a cracker of a performance. I’ll miss her a lot,” said legendary composer Khayyam in a telephone conversation with The Indian Express. Mubarak Begum worked with him in the 1964 film Shagoon where she sang the popular number Itne kareeb aake bhi, a duet with Talat Mehmood.

But, before her popularity soared in the ’60s, she’d been singing for several years, ever since composer Nashad introduced her in 1949 with Mohe aane lagi angdaai, aaja balam in Aiye. The song was picturised on lead actor Sulochana Chatterjee. With its innuendo-laden lyrics, the track had its mischief in place and revealed no trace that it was by a 13-year-old. Nashad also had Begum sing a duet with Mangeshkar. Aaiye aao chalen got lost somewhere after a while.

Mageshkar sang the famous Ayega Aanewala in Mahal the same year. “In the years that were to come, Mubarak Begum was to become a standing singer for other popular singers, recording scratches. She had to make ends meet and couldn’t throw the attitude that others could. Kamaal Amrohi’s Daaera (1953) changed that standing singer bit with the beautiful bhajan Devta tum ho mera. Jamal Sen used her voice so wonderfully that the industry took note,” says music historian Raju Bharatan, about the duet Begum sang with Mohammad Rafi.

Mubarak Begum was born in 1936 in Sujangarh in Rajasthan and was raised in Ahmedabad before she moved to Mumbai. Trained under Ustad Riazuddin Khan and Ustad Samad Khan of Kirana gharana, she became an expert on the soft murkis, a result of her training, which surfaced in many songs later. After a few songs in the ’50s, she had her golden period in the ’60s with songs such as Woh na aayenge (Devdas) and Hum haale dil sunayenge (Madhumati) and Mujhko apne gale laga lo (Humrahi). This was also when she worked with composers such as Shankar-Jaikishan, SD Burman, Ravi, Jaidev and Salil Chowdhury.

But in the late ’60s, the calls from composers and filmmakers stopped. “My songs were being cut without a reason. I sang the famous Pardesiyon se na akhiyan milana with Mohammed Rafi in Jab Jab Phool Khile. But when we watched the film, my song wasn’t there. I knew that doomsday had arrived,” said Begum, whose husband had left her by then and she was a single mother of two children and had to fend for herself.

Her death ends one of the last links with a generation of singers which had a certain lehja, a tehzeeb in their singing voices. “I’ll always remember that soft voice, the pain it had, the mischief it could have. She could’ve done with more love I think,” says Khayyam.

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