DELHI: A CITY IN SONGS

‘Yeh dilli hai mere yaar, bas ishq, mohabbat, pyaar…’

Add fixers, brokers, middlemen, meddle-ness, broken appointments, big cars, big-ger abuses, land grabbing, sprawling gardens, tombs, monuments, Punjabi music, North-South divide, colonies, campus, high- heeled malls, winters, politics, bureaucracy, muscle, chaat and chola bhatura to the syntax and it completes the Delhi song - more or less.

 It takes you everywhere.

When Rishi Kapoor screams ‘Mehbooba…’ at India Gate in Chandni (1989) and the song breaks into ‘…shaher suna tha dilli…ladki mujh se milli’ he is loud, in love and screaming from the rooftop or rather Raisina about his dilli waali girlfriend. And we see the grand buildings of the Central Vista standing tall, not to be outdone!

Song sung loud, Mehbooba from Chandni (1989)

Quite a contrast to the subtle and private expression of love in ‘Dil ka bhanwar kare pukar…’ from Tere Ghar Ke Saamne (1963), perhaps the last song to be shot inside Delhi’s Qutab Minar. The romance blossoms as the duo, Dev Anand and Nutan, descend the spiral staircase of the Minar. Both, Delhi history and its landmarks, tug and nudge in songs - for instance, one cannot ignore the imposing presence of Humayun’s tomb in ‘Shukran Allah…’ from Kurbaan, the catchy ‘Choomantar...’ song from the film Mere Brother Ki Dulhan(2011) or ‘Chand Sifarish…’ from Fanaa to name a few. A far cry from what the song ‘…aaja hum ghum ho jaaye…’ suggests - they do anything but fade into the background 

Romance jumps from landmarks to Lajpat Nagar (and the like) with songs like ‘Paani da rang…’ from Vicky Donor (2012) that don’t just serenade but take you through the close proximity of middle class lives and terrace romances. In the song ‘Ambarsariya…’ from Fukrey (2013) the hero even sends a kite message to his love interest with ‘Kya tu mujhse frandship karegi…’ asking her to give ‘kanni’ if the answer is yes and then jumping terraces to her. Can it be more Dilli colony?  

The colonies tagged ‘punju’ on the Delhi map with beauty parlour aunties, nosey neighbours, shopping in plastic baskets, bijis, pairi paunas and aloo paranthas have more to offer - they tie in dreams and aspirations too. You see it in Do Dooni Chaar (2010) where the gauging meter of Duggal family’s upward mobility lies in owning a car. In the face of disappointments that includes selling kangan to give sagan at a wedding the family still manages to dance-bindaas on ‘Na Baaja bajeya, Na ghodi chadheya….’ at a family wedding - after gulab jamuns mind you!

In Band Baaja Baraat (2010), Anushka Sharma is full of tarkibein to make her wedding planner dream a reality. Thanks to a willing partner in Bittu and break at a colony ‘lane’ wedding she ‘Ainvayi…Ainvayi’s her way into farm house and destination weddings. Marriages in general are a national obsession. Add Delhi to the mix and it gets bigger, badass, boozier and bindass complete with intrigues and complications. There have been many films that have explored the wedding genre but nothing compares to Mira Nair’s Monsoon Wedding (2001). That is a love song to Delhi. Comedy, dance, romance, family hostilities, abuse, bathroom smoking Pimmi aunties, golf playing Lalit uncles, ghazal singing family member, marigold chewing wedding planner hitting on househelp, lots of singing, ribbing, dancing, eating and all else ties foot-tappingly together in the Bally Sagoo remix ‘Aaja Nachle…o aaja nachle…’ complete with the monsoon rain and characteristic spontaneity of a Punjabi-dilli- farmhouse kind wedding!

There is one common thread running through the colonies, condos and farmhouses of Delhi - property sharks. The song ‘ Ab kya karenge bhaiya, ab kahan jayenge…’ from Khosla ka Ghosla (2006) speaks of the helplessness of a man who invests his life’s earnings into a plot of land only to realise that it has been usurped by a ruthless land shark. But he doesn’t give in without a fight! The gold rings toting, Jai Mata-ing Khurana from the film has real life avatars in real estate of Delhi exploiting buyers on an everyday basis.

Khurana, Property Dealer, Khosla Ka Ghosla

While discussing homes, a living space unique to the dilliwaalas is the humble barsaati. It is a small room at the top of a house with a large terrace that became of a way of life for the artists and idealists in the 80s. ‘Unconventional living conditions for unconventional work.’ was how it went. You see the camaraderie between three young barsaati-mates in the jaunty song ‘Pyar Lagawat…’ from Chashme Baddoor (1981). and you also see love blossoming between a blind girl and a supposed terrorist (unconventional much?) on a barsaati terrace, in barsaat with ‘ Yeh saajish hai boondon ki… dekho na’ from Fanaa.

From Fanaa to fun and Fukrey’s title song ‘Fuk fuk Fukrey…bhaaga bhooth langoti leke chaddar taan ke tu chup re…’ Agree, the lyrics are a departure from Ghalib’s poetry, a far far departure but so is Delhi. It is no longer the dilli Zauq couldn’t bear to leave. Today, Delhi is an aggregate of individual wants. But the reason the song finds place here is the energy it come with - of the young and restless college goers owning the city with ‘…raat ko jayenge India Gate’. A drive to India Gate at night spells Delhi like nothing else. It has been wonderfully captured in the song ‘Masti ki paathshaala…’ from Rang De Basanti with the leads as DU students swaying and saluting the Amar Jawan Jyoti while gedi-maroing around India Gate. They don’t show the ice cream carts but off-screen that’s a plus plus to the drive…

While dharna culture belongs to Kolkata alone, dharna or candle light vigil at India Gate (or Jantar Mantar) belongs to Delhi.  Campus politics finds its way to the site in the song ‘Tu mun shudi…’ from Raanjhanaa (2013) where collegians take on the police, get water-cannoned but continue to sit around in protest as the sun sets with the gorgeous chhatri and India Gate as the backdrop.  In Rang De Basanti’s iconic ‘Khoon Chala….’ the police unleash themselves on peaceful protestors sitting to mourn and fight for the death of their friend, an IAF officer, a victim of corruption in the Defence Ministry. We meet Delhi that cuts, burns, rapes kills,  - the gun toting, muscle flexing, drunk on power and paisa version of the city in the quick montages of the song ‘Kaat Kaleja Dilli, le gayi kaat kaleja dilli…’ from the real life based film No One Killed Jessica (2011). We know the chilling story. The trigger-happy moment where Delhi with a gun in hand stares and aims resonates in the lines ‘Thaam doonali hatthe, door ke taane matthe…’. It is raw. It is not a person. It is a city. Dilli…

It wears Jekyll & Hyde well.

If one side is sinister, the other is spiritual. We jump into the latter side of Delhi with the song ‘Kun Faya Kun...’ from Rockstar (2011). The song not only takes you through the by-lanes of Nizamuddin leading up to the dargah, it takes you on a Sufi high. The bais khwaja ki chaukhat city has been home to a thriving culture of Sufism since 13th Century. People of all faiths found spiritual solace in Sufi khanqahs or retreats, as shown in the song, adding a mystical component to the narrative of Delhi.

What this song does for Nizamuddin Dargah, ‘Arziyan…Marammat muqaddar ki karde maula’ from Delhi-6 (2009) does for Jama Masjid and in depicting the ganga-jamuni tehzeeb that Old Delhi retains – on one side you see heads bent in prayer in the largest congregational mosque and on the other an aarti is underway. Delhi 6 might have failed at the box office but its success shines in its songs that showcase a way of life in old Delhi right from drying chillies and papads on terraces in ‘Sasural Genda Phool….’ kabootarbaazi in ‘Masakalli…’, the fervour of Ram Leela, the kuchas and katras, havelis, markets, garam jalebis, kite flying and even the transformation of a purani dilli girl into her modern avatar as she travels out of the old into new. The orchestra of sights, smells, sounds shines through in ‘ gali hai mastano ki dilli…. dilli’ number from the film. Delhi has grown into climate-controlled shopping malls, think ‘Suno Aisha…’ at Emporio in the film Aisha, and high-rise condos but the daily life that goes on at a street level in Chandni Chowk continues to captivate

A lot happens on terraces, Sasural Genda Phool, Delhi 6

Many corners, many films and many songs catch different pulses racing through different pockets of Delhi. You can find your version/ aversion of Delhi in songs - at worst steal, at best borrow

‘Maange ki ghodi hai toh kya, baithe toh dulha ban gaye….’

The city makes allowances!