10 Unknown facts of Mohammed Rafiâs career

On Mohammed Rafi’s 100th birth anniversary today, the team at Filmfare’s archives has toiled to get you the most un-heard of stories and factoids from the legendary singer’s career. We dare you the reader. If you’ve known more than 3 of these facts, then we’ll declare you die-hard Mohammed Rafi fans. Go on and get acquainted with a singer who ruled the roost in Hindi film music before Kishore Kumar, RD Burman and Rajesh Khanna broke that trend.

Fact 1

Mohammed Rafi went on record saying that the first song of his life was the Soniye ni heeriye ni duet with Zeenat Begum in the Punjabi film Gul Baloch (1944). That number was composed by Shyam Sunder, as was, according to Rafi, the first song he sang for a Hindi film. Mohammed Rafi has, as we know, identified that Hindi number as Aji dil ho kaaboo mein to dildaar ki aisi taisi from Village Girl (1945). However, Rafi’s first song in Hindi films might have been in 1944 and not 1945, it was composed by Naushad and not Shyam Sunder, it was in Pahele Aap (1944) and not Village Girl. This should be obvious from the fact that the record number of Rafi’s Dildaar ki aisi taisi (Village Girl) song (with GM Durrani & Chorus) is GE3596, while the record number of his Pahele Aap chorus song for Naushad is GE3416. The opening line of that Pahele Aap chorus number was Hindostan ke hum hain Hindostan hamara.

Fact 2

Rafi’s memory of the Village Girl number was probably sharper because, in it, he was pitted opposite GM Durrani, the super singer he later came to replace in the esteem of music directors. In fact, Naushad himself favoured GM Durrani those days, alongside Shyam Kumar. It was only after 1950 that Rafi emerged as the voice of Naushad. Thus, for his first solo under the baton of Naushad, Rafi had, after making his Hindi debut under that composer in 1944, to wait until Anmol Ghadi (1946) where he sang Tera khilauna toota balak.

Fact 3

In the same year (1946) as Anmol Ghadi came Shahjehan, the film we remember not only for the vivid vibrance of Shamshad Begum (Jab usne gesoo bikhraye baadal aaya jhoom ke), but also for the creative collaboration of KL Saigal and Naushad that yielded such musical gems as Ae dil-e-bekarar jhoom, Gham diye mustaqil, Chah barbaad karegi, Jab dil hi toot gaya and Kar leejiye chal kar meri jannat ke nazaare. And Shahjehan was a film to remember for Rafi, too, since in it Naushad had offered him his first, and last, opportunity to sing with Saigal. Roohi roohi roohi mere sapnon ki raani was the song from Shahjehan rendered by KL Saigal and Mohammed Rafi. With his phenomenal range and resonance, Mohammed Rafi remains, alongside Lata Mangeshkar, one of the greatest singing talents ever known to Hindi cinema. One may regularly get to hear the songs Rafi sang after 1950. But it’s rare to listen to the 270 Hindi songs he sang early in his career, between 1944 and 1950.

Fact 4

Mohammed Rafi’s first big break under Naushad came in Chandni Raat (1949), the Naseem-Shyam starrer in which he had three memorable duets with Shamshad Begum, besides a solo. Kaise baje dil ka sitaar, Chhin ke dil kyun pher leen aankhen and Khabar kya thi ki gham khana padenga are the three Shamsh-Rafi duets from the film while Dil ho unhen mubarak jo dil ko dhoodhte hain is the Rafi solo song.

Fact 5

The disc-records of Naushad’s Dillagi (1949) were released almost side by side with the disc-records of Chandni Raat. And Dillagi saw Rafi score once again under Naushad in the solos: Is duniya mein ae dil waalo and Tere kooche mein armanon ki duniya le ke aaya hoon. Even so, those prize duets with Suraiya in Dillagi, Tu mera chaand and Zaalim zamana mujh ko, went to Shyam Kumar, not Rafi. However, later in 1949, Kardar’s Dulari (starring Madhubala, Suresh and Geeta Bali) saw Naushad opting for Lata and Rafi, rather than Shamshad and Rafi, as his main singers. All of us warm even today to the Pahadi virtuosity of Rafi in Dulari through Suhani raat dhal chuki. But it was the surpassing voice quality of both Lata and Rafi in two Dulari duets that finally convinced Naushad that these two had inevitably to be his two main singers. Mil mil ke gaayenge ho and Raat rangili mast nazaare were those two Dulari duets.

Fact 6

Maybe it was Naushad who put Rafi on the Baiju Bawra peak for that singer finally to clinch the issue as our number one playback. But the only composer to trust Rafi fully in his salad years was Firoz Nizami, who died in Pakistan four years back, leaving behind a wife and 17 children. ‘Firoz Nizami, BA’ is remembered as the man who composed for Rafi in Jugnu that singer’s breakthrough duet with Noorjehan: Yahan badla wafaa ka. That was in 1947. But, in 1945 itself, Firoz Nizami had spotted the immense potential of Rafi by bestowing on him three solos in Sharbati Ankhen. Then in 1946, there were two more solos for Rafi.

Mohamed Rafi Noorjehan partnered in Rafi’s ‘Jugnu’ breakthrough from Firoz Nizami to Wadia Movietone’s Naseem-Trilok Kapoor starrer, ‘Amar Raj’. But the first number that Rafi recorded for ‘Amar Raj’ was the famous competition song with Mohantara Talpade. JBH Wadia reveals that he then went questing for Rafi in the Bhendi Bazar locality of Bombay, since he felt this tenor alone had the voice quality for that crucial competition number. Main jab chhedoon prem tarana naache mere saath zamana was the song from Amar Raj where Rafi sang with Mohantara.

Fact 7

Like Talat Mahmood, Mukesh and CH Atma, Rafi too momentarily toyed with the idea of becoming a singing-star. In fact, in a famous number from the Swarnalata-Nazir starrer, Laila Majnu (1945), Rafi made a personal appearance on the screen. That number, put over by Rafi with SD Batish & Co under the music direction of Pt Gobindram, was on every young man’s lips those days as the tribute-in-song of Majnu to his Laila. That 1945 ‘Laila Majnu’ number in which Rafi presented an incredibly handsome sight on the screen was Tera jalwa jisne dekha woh diwana ho gaya mere saath zamana.

Fact 8

Pt Gobindram and Firoz Nizami may have tapped the talent of Rafi earlier than others, Shyam Sunder may have been the first to open the way for Rafi with seven songs to render in Bazaar (1949) – among them the Ae mohabbat unse milne ka bahana ban gaya and Apni nazar se duur woh duets with Lata-Naushad may have finally come to settle on Rafi as the ghost voice nonpareil, but it was really Husnlal Bhagatram who gave this colt, bred to stay, his head, for Rafi to go on to make every post a winning one. Rafi’s breakthrough film with Husnlal Bhagatram was the Nargis-Shyam starrer, Meena Bazar (1950), in which his voice figured in 10 of 12 songs, among them the duets with Lata – O maahi O maahi O, Apna bana ke chhod naheen jaana and Paas aa ke huye hum duur. Perhaps compositionally most noteworthy in Meena Bazar was the song in which Rafi sang two versions, one with Shamshad and Lata Mangeshkar on the other. Equally worthy of notice, had been a Rafi, Geeta Dutt, Lata Mangeshkar number, scored by Husnlal Bhagatram a year earlier for Suraiya-Shyam’s Naach. It was Lab pe fariyaad hai dil barbaad hai.

Fact 9

Not only for Naushad and OP Nayyar, but also for SD Burman (Dada), Rafi was the greatest singer going. When Dada was composing what he felt to be the best score of his life for Guide, he could think of only Rafi as the male singer capable of doing true justice to the complex theme, though the film’s hero was Dev Anand and Kishore Kumar was the obvious choice as his playback. But Dada confined Kishore in Guide to the Gaata rahe duet with Lata, while drawing the best out of Rafi in Kya se kya ho gaya, Din dhal jaaye and Tere mere sapne. Guide came in 1965, while Rafi’s first song for Dada Burman had been, 18 years earlier, a solo in Filmistan’s Do Bhai (1947). Duniya mein meri aaj andhera hi andhera was that first SD Burman and Mohammed Rafi collaboration.

Fact 10

If Rafi thought that, after helping Dilip Kumar to win his spurs as a tragedian with Yahan badla in Jugnu (1947), his voice would become a ‘fixture’ on that ‘hero of heroes’, he had another think coming. For even Naushad initially favoured the voice of Mukesh to go on Dilip Kumar in Mela (1948) and Andaz (1949), while opting for the vocals of Talat Mahmood on that actor in Babul (1950). At such a time, it was, ironically, C Ramchandra, a composer never really enamoured of Rafi, who conferred on this singer the theme-song of Nadiya Ke Paar (1948), filmed on Dilip Kumar and Kamini Kaushal. More raaja ho le chal nadiya ke paar was that song from Nadiya Ke Paar that put over by Rafi with Lalita Deulkar.

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