The great association of Shammi Kapoor with Mohammed Rafi

Shammi Kapoor owes his superstardom to Dev Anand. Producer-director Nasir Hussain wanted Dev Anand for Tumsa Nahin Dekha. But the film’s financier Tolaram Jalan wanted his special friend Ameeta to play the female lead, and Dev didn’t want to work with her.

This was how Shammi Kapoor bagged the film that turned his career also. It was also the first of innumerable musical hits that Shammi did with Mohammed Rafi .

Shammi’s second major hit Teesri Manzil was also supposed to star Dev Anand. In this case,  producer Nasir Hussain was unhappy with Dev and sacked him from the project. Shammi, with whom Nasir had already done two hits, happily stepped in to sing R D Burman’s hits all  sung by Rafi. Interestingly, soon after Teesri Manzil, RD Burman switched almost completely to Kishore Kumar .

Almost every hero of the 1950s, 60s loved Rafi’s voice. But they also used other voices, for instance Dilip Kumar used both Rafi and Talat Mahmood, and sometimes Mukesh. But can  you imagine a single chartbuster of Shammi Kapoor that is not sung by Rafi? From Yun toh humne  laakh haseen dekhi hain tumsa nahin dekha in Tumsa Nahin Dekha in 1957 to Tum mujhe yun bhula na paaoge in Pagla Kahin Ka in 1971, every memorable song that Shammi sang on screen was ghost voiced by Rafi.

“He was my voice, just as Mukesh was my brother Raj Kapoor’s voice. But my brother sang in  other voices too. I couldn’t dream of any other singer. Rafi could capture my wildness my unpredictable dance moves in his voice. It was as if he could penetrate my body and soul,” said Shammi .

Shammi was right. A lot of his stardom was attributable to Rafi’s singing. Dil deke dekho (title song), Baar baar dekho in Chinatown, Govinda aala re (Bluff Master, the film also had a rare non-Rafi hit for Shammi- Socha tha pyar hum na karenge by Mukesh), Yeh chand sa roshan chehra in Kashmir Ki Kali, Chahe  koi mujhe junglee kahe in Junglee, Tumse achcha kaun hai  (title song), Badan pe sitare lapete huey in Prince, Aaj kal tere mere pyar ke charche in Bramhachari… these were the songs that defined and qualified Shammi Kapoor’s swag and stardom.

Take away these songs, and what is left of Shammi’s stardom?

Shammi made it a point to be present for all the song recordings. But once, just once, he was  out of the country. The song was Aasman se aaya farishta in Shakti Samanta’s An Evening In Paris . When Shammi returned to India and heard that the song was recorded in his absence, he had a huge showdown with Shakti Samanta and composer Jaikishan. They insisted he listen to the song .When Shammi heard what Rafi had done in Aasman se aaya farishta, he was speechless. “Rafi had sung exactly the way I was going to enact the song on screen. How  did he do it?”

Playback singers and Indian leading men have shared a terrific association over many generations. For instance, Rajesh Khanna and Kishore Kumar. But then, Khanna also had Rafi singing hits for him in Mehboob Ki Mehndi, Do Raaste and The Train.

Shammi stuck to Rafi’s voice right till Rafi’s sudden untimely death. Shammi was on the way to a pilgrimage spot with his wife Neela Devi when he was informed of Rafi’s passing away.

“It was like my voice was gone. I could never be the same Shammi Kapoor again,”  Shammi  mourned till he lived.

The last great song that Rafi sang for Shammi (in the film Pagla Kahin Ka) was prophetically  worded: Tum mujhe yun bhula na paoge/Jab kabhi bhi sunoge geet mere/Sangg sang tum bhi  gungunaoge.

Subhash K Jha is a Patna-based film critic who has been writing about Bollywood for long enough to know the industry inside out. He tweets at @SubhashK_Jha.

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