1942: A Love Story

1942: A Love Story

@ Kasauni - a fictional hill town

Naren Singh [Anil Kapoor] is to the manor born - the only son of wealthy Dewan Hari Pratap Singh, [Manohar Singh]. It’s a privileged life,   cocooned away   from the atrocities of British rule .

The spark of the country’s independence has been by ignited with the Quit India movement. General Douglas, infamous for British brutality is visiting Kasauni and a crowd collects at the town square to protest.

There is a police charge and a stampede follows. Naren is nearby but disinterested –he’s comfortably ensconced in his car with Munna [Raghubir Yadav] at the wheel. When he sees a child being mercilessly thrashed by the police, something stirs within him -   he rushes to save the boy. And the window pane of a bus is shattered in the melee.  Through shards of broken glass, Naren catches the first glimpse of a girl. Time stands still –she’s beautiful, achingly vulnerable, and he’s mesmerized.

Sings this ode for her 

Some endnotes…

Javed A speaking to Nasreen m Kabir says that there 

was no situation for this song in the original screenplay. 

Javed Akhtar suggested the song situation – amidst the riot and confusion, the hero sees the girl in a bus. Then she vanishes but he cherishes that one fleeting glimpse. The director Vidhu Vinod Chopra was apprehensive of putting in a song here but told Javed, “All right, you write the song. If it’s good we’ll use it in the film.”

After three days they met again in the music room of Rahul Dev Burman and a single line was playing in Javed’s head, ‘ek ladki koh dekha toh Asia laga …..’ and he announced that the song would comprise of only similes.

R D Burman found the idea interesting and was game. Javed wrote the first stanza in the next three minutes, with RDB composing the music right there -

Jaise khilta gulab

Jaise shayar ka khwab

Jaise ujli kiran

Jaise van main hiran

​​​​Jaise chandni raat

​​​​Jaise narmi ki baat

​​​​Jaise mandir main ho ek jalta Diya

The next 14 lines were written by Javed Akhtar over two, three days.

Jaise subah ka roop

Jaise sardi ki dhoop

Jaise veena ki taan

Jaise rangon ki jaan

Jaise balkhayen bel

Jaise lehron ka khel

Jaise khushboo liye aaye thandi hawa

Ek ladki Ko dekha toh aisa laga Jaise nachta mor

Jaise resham ki dor

Jaise pariyon ka raag

Jaise sandal ki aag

Jaise sola shinghar

Jaise ras ki phoohaar

Jaise ahista ahista badhta nasha

He used simple similes to convey the feeling of falling in love at first sight in a light, breezy manner. The typical   ‘mukhda ‘and Antara were done away with and a gentle, soothing song emerged 

Javed A mentions two songs without mukhda and antra’s which were exceptional – ‘Dil aaj shayar Hai ….’ from the film Gambler by SD Burman / Neeraj and ‘Main yeh sochkar uske dar se utha tha ….’ from the film Haqeeqat by Madan Mohan / Kaifi Azmi.  

‘Ek ladki koh dekha’ has real and abstract beauty visuals –the rose, the deer, the moonlit night, a lighted lamp, swaying branch, temple bells, fragrant cool breeze, dancing peacock, soft silken threads and Javed expressed that it wasn’t easy to write 21 similes! 

Nitin Desai more than matched them with the visuals …

A memory …