The ultimate lyricist has gone. Anand Bakshi has finally, almost incredibly, left us. The pen that grew younger every year, brooked no limitations and certainly no pretentiousness has run dry. Run dry after a non-stop run of 45 years and almost 4500 songs during which it proved that a monumental talent had no need to tom-tom its presence, manipulate the media, show off its writing skills at the expense of the situation, character and script or attend mushairas to show he was a great poet...

ANAND Bakshi was one of a kind.

Philosophy, cynicism, spirituality, patriotism or metaphor-rich flowery love songs — the great names of lyricdom excelled or were known for their grip on lyrics in one or two of these genres. Maybe that is why Anand Bakshi was never considered in their league - creatively and otherwise, the man simply refused to be strait-jacketed anywhere, though given the opportunity, Bakshi could match the best in each of them. “A lyricist is a poet at heart,” he told me once. “But he does not write to satisfy his own creative urges, and does not unnecessarily display his knowledge of language. As a lyricist in films, one has to write for every conceivable situation and for characters ranging from a tawaif to a child, a boatman to a pop star. I hate using heavy language - anything can be written with simplicity. In our country we demand funny qualifications of a poet. You must write in obscure language, attend mushairas, contribute to Urdu magazines and publish books in verse! But look at our folk songs - many of them have greater depth than all the shaayari and heavy kavitayen!”

Other Stroies

TAMIL POP— The slump and the revival

Born on July 21, 1930 in Rawalpindi, Bakshi hailed from a family of army and bank personnel. Not much is known and even less certain about his early life, and there are different versions about his being in the army or navy. The radio addict and habitual singer was also fond of writing poems - some of which were published - and actually served in a bank till 1956. He came to Mumbai determined to be in films, if not as a lyricist, then as a singer. The first break (in Bhagwan’s 1958 film Bhala Aadmi with music by Nisar Bazmi) came almost immediately, the breakthrough took four years (Mehndi Lage Mere Haath/1962 with Kalyanji Anandji), and after Devar (1964/Roshan), Himalay Ki God Mein and Jab Jab Phool Khile (both Kalyanji Anandji/1965), Anand Bakshi zoomed to the top echelons and remained there, to notch up almost 575 films, more than 250 of which were with the phenomenal Laxmikant Pyarelal alone.

THE PEERLESS LYRICIST

BAKSHI’S songs were suffused with the warmth that only a good human being could radiate. There are so many lyrics where the songs touched an instant chord, cheered you up immeasurably, or brought a lump to your throat, but there are others where the song you loved would keep tantalising you till weeks or even years later, the real meaning would hit you like a thunderbolt!

For example, ‘Mere deewanepan ki bhi dawaa nahin’ (Mehboob Ki Mehndi/1971) was a song that hooked the populace instantly. But how many realize even three decades later how beautifully Bakshi expressed the unspoken emotional telepathy of two lovers with the second line, ‘Maine jaane kya sun liya, toone to kuch kahaa nahin!’

Bakshi, who could write your ‘Choli ke peeche kya hai (Khal-Nayak), ‘Jumma chumma de de’ (Hum), ‘Saat saheliyan’ (Vidhaata) and ‘Le gayee’ (Dil To Pagal Hai) as easily as a ‘Chingari koi bhadke’ (Amar Prem) and Chanchal sheetal nirmal komal (Satyam Shivam Sundaram) would often couch the deepest of philosophies in the simplest of phraseology. His songs, as Javed Akhtar once told me, “will always be cherished as folk songs. They will instruct, inspire and elevate, because they have the power to change society.”

Such was the potency of Bakshi’s popular and prolific writing that he could present uncomfortable posers, or offer guidance or inspiration with his awesome insights into human nature, universal truisms and the axioms of life. In the song ‘Nafrat ki duniya (Haathi Mere Saathi) for which he was given a special award by the SPCA (Society for Prevention Of Cruelty to Animals) he questions, “Jab jaanwar koi insaan ko maare/ Kehte hain duniya mein vahashi usse saare, Ek jaanwar ki jaan aaj insaano ne li hai/ Chhup kyoon hai sansaar?”

At the premiere of Jab Jab Phool Khile are seen lyricist Anand Bakshi, Shashi Kapoor, producer Hiren Khera and Kalyanji-Anandji

In Amar Prem, through the lips of Rajesh Khanna, he scoffs at the judgmental hypocrisy of society with “Kuchh to log kahenge/Logon ka kaam hai kehna/Chhodo bekaar ki baaton mein/Kahin beet na jaaye raina!” In Dost, he wrote what is inarguably one of the most optimistic and cheering songs in Hindi film music, “Gaadi bulaa rahi hai/ Seeti bajaa rahi hai” in which he penned the unforgettable lines, “Dekho woh rail, baccho ka khel/ Seekho sabak jawaano/ Sar pe hai bojh/ seene mein aag/ lab pe dhuan hai jaano/ phir bhi woh gaa rahi hai/ naghme sunaa rahi hain!”

And in that masterpiece from Aya Sawan Jhoom Ke, he pens those wonderfully thought-provoking lines, “Yeh shama to jali roshni ke liye/ iss shama se agar lag jaaye to yeh shama kya karen?/ yeh hawaa to chali saans le har koi/ ghar kisika ujad jaaye aandhi mein to yeh hawaa kya kare?”
And an axiom of cosmic proportions lies in the deceptive simplicity of his Anurodh number, “Tum besahara ho to kisika sahara bano/ tumko apen aap hi sahara mil jaayega/ kashti koi doobti pahunchaa do kinare pe tumko apne aap hi kinara mil jaayega.”

Bakshi’s patriotism was rarely overt, but its subtlety (“Des paraya chhod ke aaja/ panchhi pinjra tod ke aaja/ aaja umar bahut hai chhoti/ apne ghar mein bhi hai roti/ chitthi aayi hai”/ Naam) and sting (“Teri baahon mein dekhoon sanam auron ki baahein/ main laaoonga kahaan se bhalaa aisi nigahein/ yeh koi raks hoga, koi dastoor hoga/ mujhe dastoor aisa kahaan manzoor hoga/ bhalaa kaise yeh mera lahoo ho jaaye paani/ maine kaise bhool jaoon main hoon Hindustani/ yahaan main ajnabi hoon”/ Jab Jab Phool Khile) reflected the fierce pride of a nationalist who could never go over-the-top merely because he needed literary appreciation.

“Story sunkar hi mind chalta hai,” he once told me, explaining his reluctance then to write for albums, though he later worked on Raju Singh’s Dhun and Talat Aziz’s Khubsoorat (some others are on the way) because “they offered me imaginary situations.” And therein lies the crux of Bakshi’s complete self-identity as a lyricist. For him, the situations in albums were ‘imaginary’, but those in films were ‘real’! For Bakshi became that boatman, that pop star, that tawaif and that child, to quote his own four categories, when needed.

He admitted that songs like “Maine poochha chand se” (Abdullah) and “Chingari koi bhadke” (Amar Prem) were written by him as poems in the pre-film days, but stressed that he would offer such songs from his ‘stock’ only when he felt that they matched a situation to perfection.

I recall Padma Shri Neeraj, that giant among Hindi poets and scholars, telling me, “Jo situation ki pakad Bakshi ko hai, kisi ko nahin. I admire so many of the great lyricists, but he is unmatched!’
A Raj Khosla anecdote comes to mind. “I had finalized the title of my film Main Tulsi Tere Aangan Ki and Laxmikant had composed the line to a terrific tune. But we were flummoxed for even a dummy second line. Bakshi had a fractured leg then and was convalescing at home. We went there and I told him the storyline of my film. Instantly, Bakshi replied, ’Oh, the second line is very simple. It should be “Koi nahin main tere saajan ki.” Awe crept into Khosla’s voice when he added, “In six everyday words that fitted the tune perfectly, Bakshi had encapsulated the entire theme of my film!”
Many an apparent example of catchy rhyme written by Bakshi took on another dimension in the film, as in the Gumrah number, “O tere pyar ko salaam o sanam/ meri jaan tere naam o sanam/ main teri ho gayi teri kasam.”

Now let us examine the situation - here is this tapori guy who is completely in (one-sided) love with the heroine, who is a star and rebuffs him. The heroine is later framed in Hong Kong for carrying narcotics, and gets the death penalty. The hero manages by hook and crook to reach there and engineer her acquittal, saving her life. Now examine the lines again - what a different meaning appears!

The Bakshi forte was writing a song that was so perfect that one could never imagine any other lines in their place, and never imagine those lines elsewhere. As he once told me, “A song always exists hidden in a given situation. All that I have to do is take it out!”

THE SECRET OF HIS SUPREMACY

What were the other secrets of Bakshi’s complete supremacy as a lyricist? Certain things that he said in the many exhaustive interviews with him over the years give some insight into his enduring success.

“I give several antaras (stanzas) for every song even if only two or three are needed. I gave Mahesh Bhatt 15 antaras for a song in Zakhm. He asked me why I had written so many. But that way, both he and I will be satisfied. When you are a buyer, you must have a wide choice to make the right decision!”

“The humblest businessman knows that when he is selling something, the buyer is paying him for something that HE has liked. You cannot tell him to buy what YOU as a seller like and expect him to pay you for it too.”

“There is no substitute for hard work, In any field that is the first requisite. There is no room for complacency either: If you have won one race, you cannot assume that you will win next time. The effort has to be the same every single time. People pay hard-earned money for entertainment and they deserve the best!”

“I approach every song with the nervous fear that I will not be able to write it, aur yehi darr mujhe shakti deta hai.”

“As a song “Ghar aaja pardesi” from Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge may be superior to “Tujhe dekha to yeh jaana sanam” for which I won an award, but it was nowhere as popular. The public must feel that the judges have been just. You may write the best lyrics ever written, but if they do not become popular, the song will never even be noticed, let alone awarded. For Ek Duuje Ke Liye, the same thing happened, I won an award for “Tere mere beech mein” when “Solah baras ki bali umar” was not even nominated. But why should I feel upset? I have never tried to project myself at the expense of a film.”

“Change is axiomatic. I believe in changing with the times. Today’s generation is more open, more forthright. Like there was an element of sobriety even in the comic older songs.”

“I miss writing the sad song, which is extinct today. Probably the people are very happy. Or maybe there is so much sadness that they cannot bear to see it on screen too!”

“I mentally tape a situation and try and see the circumstances, mood and story before and after the song. You cannot write the same song, even for the same feelings, when the lovers are meeting clandestinely and when they are meeting openly.”

“Insight and richness in lyrics come when you have lived in the countryside, experienced the gaon ke mele, the harvest festivals, the moonlit fields and the winter bonfires. And a good story and a good filmmaker are important too.”

“Destiny is all-powerful, which is why I cannot understand what people hope to gain by manipulations. The wheels keep turning. I remember Guru Dutt turning down Dada Burman’s recommendation that I work in Kaagaz Ke Phool. The film flopped. I was destined to form a hit team with SD Burman only a decade later with Aradhana and many other films.”

“A song can be written in 20 minutes or may take weeks. It is not necessary that longer time spent on a song yields a better product.”

“I do not make unreasonable demands or thrust my seniority on youngsters. That is why I have no problems working with younger composers and filmmakers.”

“A director came to know some years ago because he had dropped his lyricist midway and he wanted me to write ‘hit’ songs. I told him, ‘maaf kijiye, maine zindagi mein kabhi hit gaana nahin likha”!’

—Rajiv Vijayakar