Christmas and New Year in Bokaro Steel City

Christmas and New Year in Bokaro Steel City
Winter Season Celebrations. 1968. Bokaro Steel City (Now Jharkhand)

Winter Season Celebrations. 1968. Bokaro Steel City (Now Jharkhand) Image and Narrative contributed by Madhavi Singh (nee Jain) , Mumbai Christmas and New Year celebrations were being organised in Bokaro Steel City. At the time my father, an engineer, was stationed in Bokaro working for a Birla Concern - SIMCO designing the gates of the Tenughat Dam. As an entertainment and socialising hub, the Bokaro Club was the epicentre of our small town. For the 1968 celebrations, to include the children performances had been organised by and for us. We were to perform amongst family, friends, parents, colleagues and our own peers, a daunting thought, specially for my friends and I who were very young. I was going to perform as a dancer. There were four dances that evening and I at the age of 3+ years was the only child who was chosen to dance in all four. I was daunted yes, but also very excited. There are two songs I danced to that I remember very distinctly. One was, “Pallo latke zara sa pallu latke” . In retrospect, it was one of the most famous songs in Northern India; originally a folk song it got hugely popular as a hindi Movie Naukar's soundtrack; people and children both would perform to at events - Be it a club like ours or a wedding, or a school event ; then there was also the famous Haryanvi folk song “ji ka janjaal mora bajra, udh udh jaye mora bajra” (folk song about Pearl Millet, staple grain diet of Northern India). Both songs as we now realise were taught to and performed by several children (now adults) across the country and had them dancing at most…

Continue Reading

His advise helped manifest one of India’s most famous songs

His advise helped manifest one of India’s most famous songs
My grand-aunt, RD Burman and my granduncle on the Burman Terrace, Calcutta, West Bengal. 1975

My grand-aunt, RD Burman and my granduncle on the Burman Terrace, Bombay, Maharashtra. 1975 Image and Narrative contributed by Anupam Mukerji, Mumbai This picture was photographed on the terrace of R.D Burman's home in Bombay.R.D Burman was one of India's finest Music composers of the Indian Film Industry. With him are my grand-uncle Nirmal Kumar Dasgupta and his wife Shukla.RD, whom he lovingly called Tublu, was the apple of my granduncle's eye. RD loved him back equally calling him Moni Dadu. R.D Burman's mother was my grand uncle's sister, technically a niece, but since they were closer in age the relationship was like a close sibling. In March of 1975, Moni Dadu and family were visiting R.D Burman. RD was busy recording the soundtrack for now India's biggest box office hit film ever, Sholay. On this morning, sitting on his terrace, RD was playing back for Moni Dadu the scratch recording (rough recording) of his now exceptionally famous song Mehbooba Mehbooba. He had been recording the song through the night. RD had recorded the song in his own voice, even though the final song was to be recorded in Kishore Kumar's. Liking what he had just heard, Moni Dadu advised RD to keep the song in his voice. As fate would have it, Moni Dadu's wish was granted. Kishore Kumar was late for the recording of Mehbooba Mehbooba and RD decided to record the song himself. As we say the rest is history. From the 1960s to the 1990s, R.D Burman composed scores for 331 movies and influenced a generation of Indian music directors. He would have been 73 today, on June 27, 2012.

Continue Reading
Close Menu