Barsaat ki Raat – All about the music and THE ULTIMATE Qawali

Barsaat ki Raat is a black & white movie from 1960, starring Madhubala and Bharat Bhushan, directed by P.L. Santoshi. The screenplay was by Santoshi & Bharat Bhushan and is a love story of a poet/singer and a very beautiful girl, who inspires him… Madhubala is perfect as the Muse and of course looks absolutely gorgeous. But then I have not yet seen a single movie of hers in which she didn’t look absolutely gorgeous!! Bharat Bhushan is believable as a poet (and quite sad poet in the second half). And some of the situations are extremely romantic. But Madhubala does not have a lot of role or scope to sparkle and Bharat Bhushan’s role is anyway that of a sad poet/singer…

The real hero of the movie is the music – this is Roshan at his best!! And the lyrics by Saahir are perfect for every situation.  In fact, towards the end it seems like the movie is about Qawalis and Qawali competitions and the love story of the singer and his muse is the side plot…

The movie starts with “Garajat barasat Sawan Aayo re” – a very melodious composition in Gaud Malhar. Two sisters Shamaa (Shaamaa) and Shabaab (Ratna), daughters of Mubaarak Ali, a Qawali singer, singing this for their Riyaaz.  This song kind of sets the tone of the movie. Amaan (Bharat Bhushan) is their neighbor and Shamaa is in love with him. He treats her with a lot of respect and Shabnam, her younger sister as a spoilt child. Their father wants Amaan to write poetry for him to participate in Qawali competition which Amaan is agreeable to, but after he gets back from Hyderabad.

Amaan goes to Hyderabad and gets a spot on All India Radio Hyderabad to sing his composition, if it is new and good.  And while walking around looking for inspiration, he and Shabnam (Madhubala) have a chance meeting on a stormy, rainy evening. Amaan is completely taken in by her beauty and her “adaas”. The next day, Amaan sings his new poem/composition which is inspired by that chance meeting where he feels he met a “pari”, on All India Radio Hyderabad. The movie gets its name from that rainy evening and the song Amaan sings. This is the famous “Zindagi bhar nahi bhoolegi woh Barsaat ki Raat” song. This is probably the best known song of the movie.

Shabnam knows Amaan Hyderabadi, the poet and is fan of his poetry but has never seen him till now. So when she hears the song on the radio she realizes that the person she ran into in the rain was him.

The next song is “Meine shayad tumhe pehle bhi kabhi dekha hai…”, which Amaan sings, in a function where Shabnam’s friend, Shanti welcomes him and tells him that someone would like to hear his “Zindagi bhar nahi bhoolegi” once again, he wants to know who that is and Shanti points to Shabnam….

Amaan is staying with his friend Shekhar, who is a police inspector and Shabnam’s father, Khan Bahadur, is the police commissioner.  So through Shekhar, Amaan takes up the job as a teacher who would go and home school Commissioner’s younger daughter, Razia. And so Amaan and Shabnam start meeting on daily basis. He is distracted while teaching Razia because Shabnam is around and she is watching him from the Window and looking absolutely gorgeous…

But the commissioner is against the idea of Shabnam marrying Amaan and he wants to get her married to his friend’s son.  Amaan and Shabnam elope and go to Indore. He changes his name to Kamaal Lukhnawi. We hear the second version of “Zindagi bhar nahi bhoolegi eyh raat”  at this point – Lata & Rafi. Simple situation, lovely song and gorgeous Madhubala – its lovely and romantic! Then on Indore radio he recites a najm – “Kya Gam jo andheri hai ratey” – its not a song really – its just recitation of the najm. No accompanying musical instruments – only Rafi’s wonderful voice, and a lot of emotions….. I love hearing Rafi recite najms, poems, gazhals with no accompanying music…Anyway…

Though he has changed his name, the commissioner and Shekhar recognize his voice and make a call at Indore Radio station. So Amaan And Shabnam run from Indore too. They go to Jabalpur(I think) to Amaan’s friend, Sudhakar’s place.  But Shekhar catches up with them here just before Shabnam and Amaan get married and forces Shabnam  to go back home.  She leaves a message for Amaan to meet her at their meeting place in Hyderabad but she can’t go there since she is locked in the house. Amaan sings a very sad but beautiful song here – “Mayoos to hoon wadese tere”…

There are a lot of coincidences after this point – like Khan Bahadur takes Shabnam to Luckhnow and Amaan also has gone to Luckhnow. Not only that, he has gone to the same house, since the person Khan Bahadur wants Shabnam to marry is Amaan’s friend. On the train to Luckhnow, Amaan meets a person who is pretending to be Amaan Hyderabadi. And (I don’t understand why but) agrees to go with that person as his understudy, with Chand Khan qawwal and his troupe who are going for a qawali competition. In Luckhnow, Amaan meets Shabnam just for a few seconds at his friend Aftaab, house when he is leaving and she is out in the verandah. She gets scared and tells him to go away and forget her….

After this point, the movie is all about qawali competitions. The first one is between Chand Khan and Shamaa & Shabaab. This one, Chand Khan wins on the strengths of Amaan’s pen.  The qawali here is “Nigaahe naaz ke maron ka haal kya hoga…” Mubaarak Ali’s sponsor asks for a repeat contest and so there is another competition between the same 2 groups – and this time Shamaa & Shabaab win because Amaan comes to their rescue.  And the qawali is “Pehchanta hoon khoob tumhari nazar ko mai…”  Though these two qawalis are not very well known, they are lovely, andnd built the tempo for the final and the ultimate one really well.

Mubaarak Ali, Shabnam & of course Shamaa is very happy to have Amaan with them again. Shamaa also sings the very happy and melodious “Mujhe mil gaya bahaana tere deed ka, kaisi khushi leke aaya chaand eid ka” – Lata’s voice is absolutely amazing in this one!

There are some missing pieces I think, because the final qawali takes place in Jaipur (I think), where again by coincidence, Shabnam and her family are visiting Khan Bahadur’s friend. Shamaa and Shabaab then meet Shabnam who is not keeping well (thanks to her broken heart, but Shamaa and Shabaab don’t know this). And Shamaa, also brings “taveej” for her – and then finds out that Shabnam and Amaan love each other…. So when she comes for the final qawali, the ultimate one, she is very sad (and you see her crying – I always used to wonder about that…)

“Naa to karavaan ki talaash hai….” Followed by “Yeh Ishq Ishq hai” is a long qawali, sung by many singers. The lyrics are wonderful, and the music is just awesome! The tempo goes on building. And though every singer has sung their pieces really, really well, I just love Rafi’s (Amaan’s) entry with a taan – his voice has magic! Shabnam is listening to this on the radio and hearing Amaan’s voice she is so mesmerized that she runs from the house and goes to the venue of the competition. She reaches the venue to hear “Jab jab Krishnaki bansi baji” With this qawali, one can imagine someone getting mesmerized and just wanting to go to the person singing it. I get goose bumps listening to this lovely composition. This is definitely the best ever qawali in a Hindi movie. And no the qawali has even come close to it in last 50 years….

The movie ends about 5 minutes after this qawali is over. Aftaab asks Khan Bahadur to let Shabnam marry Amaan and Khan Bahadur agrees… Normally, I would feel that why couldn’t they wrap this up earlier, make us go through so many hoops before coming to this simple solution. But in case of this movie, I am glad that they didn’t!! In my opinion the main point of this movie is the music and “Ishq Ishq hai” in particular.

So watch this movie!! – Not for the story, not for the acting, not even for Madhubala (thought she IS as always, absolutely gorgeous ), but for the lyrics and the music! This movie belongs to Saahir and Roshan more than anyone you see on the screen!!