Ye barkha bahaar sautaniyaa ke dwaar
Posted on: November 11, 2011
“Mayur Pankh”(1954) is a movie produced by Sahu Films and directed by Kishore Sahu. The movie had Kishore Sahu,Sumitra Devi, Helen, David, Asha Mathur, Seema, Cuckoo, Ramesh Gupta, Odette Ferguson etc in it.
Here is a mujra song from this movie. the song is sung by Lata and Asha Bhonsle. If the song is sung by two real life sisters, then the dance too is performed by two real life sisters, who were known as Vajiffdar sisters. They are Roshan Vajifdar-Ghosh (in red dupatta) who married Dr Ghosh and on the right Khurshid Vajifdar-Chavda. They had another Sister Shireen (who married Mulkraj Anand) who is not there in this picturisation.
Jeroo Chavda, the son of Khurshid Vajifdar-Chawda had posted a comment on this song in the blog Dances on the foothpath which I quote here, with due acknowledgement to Richard S, the owner of that blog.
Yeh Barkha Bahar – does feature the Vajifdar sisters who broke the mould of the anglicised Parsi community by expressing their love for Indian music and dance. The dancer on the left with a red dupatta is in fact Roshan Vajifdar-Ghosh (my aunt) who married Dr Ghosh and on the right Khurshid Vajifdar-Chavda (my mother) who married artist Shiavax Chavda. Shirin Vajifdar (who’s married to Mulk Raj Anand) is not in this video, though people would often mix Khurshid and Shirin up as they looked quite similar.
The Vajifdar sisters had trained in Kathak from Sohanlal, BharatNatyam from Ram Gopal, Manipuri from Bipin Sinha and Kathakali and Mohini-attam from Guru Krishna Kutty, very unusual for today’s times where the dancer only trains extensively in 1 or 2 styles.
Roshan Vajifdar was a national scholar in BharatNatyam and studied in Madras (Chennai) for two years intensively and also learnt Sanskrit and Tamil for her research. Roshan was painted frequently in life-sized portraits by artist Roerich, (husband of actress Devika Rani) in Bangalore where she was studying dance. Shirin and Khurshid did the summer course at Almora – Uday Shankar’s school and at Madam Menka’s school in Khandala where Shirin studied intensively for 2 years. Shirin also studied the Abhinaya Darpanam and Sanskrit shlokas from Guru Parvati Kumar. They had learnt BharatNatyam from Guru Chinaiya Pillai in Tanjore in 1947. Khurshid had also studied BharatNatyam from Guru Ramini in Mumbai. Their dance presentations were much appreciated not only for the finesse of their dance movements and beauty of the choreographed compositions but also for the exotic and ethnic jewellery and costumes that Shirin designed with her eye for detail and superb colour combinations. Shirin was sent in the entourage of artistes representing India with Indrani Rehman and others to China. Roshan represented India in East Germany and Mongolia. Khurshid could not accompany them as she was pregnant with her second child.
They were invited to perform before many heads of states for eg Shah of Iran with his first wife Soraiya and Jewaharlal Nehru. Also gave many shows on the ship Battori on which they sailed to London. They performed extensively in India and Mumbai in the Sea Greens hotel, Taj Mahal Hotel, Eros and Regal theatres. Shirin also gave many lectures/demonstrations in Haryana and Punjab universities.The dance director Krishnan Kutty of Mayur Pankh was incidentally their Kathakali teacher and was also part of their troupe especially when they toured in London in 1952. He was the male lead in their ballets ‘The Transposed Heads’ the English commentary from the adapted version by Dr Mulk Raj Anand and ‘The Birth Of Urvashi’.
Apart from their Classical training, they also learnt a lot of folk dances to intersperse their Classical performances with and to teach numerous generations of children who came to learn under them at their dance academies.
………..
My mother recollects that the conditions were appaling during the shoot of the movie. They had to report by 6am and the studios weren’t air-conditioned at that time and make-up was thick and waxy and stars would only arrive at 3 and 4pm in the afternoon and the shoot would go on till 9pm. So it was extremely exhausting for the supporting actors and that’s one of the main reasons that Khurshid, Shirin and Roshan didn’t accept other film roles that were offered after the success of this movie. Plus it took them a long time to get the remuneration that was owed to them.
The picturisation also shows a distinguised gathering of India and British dignitaries watching the performance, some curiously, and others wearing bored and quizzical expressions on their faces.
Shailendra is the lyricist. Shankar Jaikishan is the music director.
This rare song is a masterpiece both aurally as well as visually.
Audio
Video
Song-Ye barkha bahaar sautaniyaa ke dwaar (Mayur Pankh) (1954) singers-Lata, Asha Bhonsle, Lyrics-Shailendra, MD-Shankar Jaikishan
Both
Lyrics
aaa aaaa aaaa
aaa aaa aaa
ye barkhaa bahaar,
sautaniyaa ke dwaar
na jaa more saanwre piyaa
ye barkhaa bahaar,
sautaniyaa ke dwaar
na jaa more saanwre piyaa
na jaa more saanwre piyaa
na jaa more saanwre piyaa
andheri raat ghataaon se dard barsegaa
andheri raat ghataaon se dard barsegaa
tere binaa jale ye dil sej pyaar tarsegaa
main ro-ro maroon,
tore painyaan padoon
na jaa more saanwre piyaa
ye barkhaa bahaar,
sautaniyaa ke dwaar
na jaa more saanwre piyaa
na jaa more saanwre piyaa
na jaa more saanwre piyaa
tere bagair kyaa mazaa hai zindagaani mein
tere bagair kyaa mazaa hai zindagaani mein
na jaao beraham lagaa ke aag paani mein
na jaao beraham lagaa ke aag paani mein
aaa aaa aaa
ye thandi phuhaar,
ye koyal pukaar
na jaa more saanwre piyaa
ye barkhaa bahaar,
sautaniyaa ke dwaar
na jaa more saanwre piyaa
na jaa more saanwre piyaa
na jaa more saanwre piyaa
ghadi nahin ye dil ke sabr aazmaane ki
ghadi nahin ye dil ke sabr aazmaane ki
hai rut nazar se nazar dil se dil milaane ki
ye pehlaa ashaadh dikhaa de dulaar
na jaa more saanwre piyaa
ye barkhaa bahaar,
sautaniyaa ke dwaar
na jaa more saanwre piyaa
na jaa more saanwre piyaa
na jaa more saanwre piyaa
Atul’s Song A Day- A choice collection of Hindi Film & Non-Film Songs 
August 20, 2022 at 10:55 pm
Nice to read about Vajifdar sisters.
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