The First Man of Rabindrasangeet
My life in Kolkata began as a Paying Guest with a Tamilian family, at 2/3 Sebak Baidya Street, opposite National High School for Boys. It was an old but well-maintained, single-storied house with spacious rooms. My room was large and well-ventilated, with an independent entrance, furnished with a single cot, writing table, bookshelf, and a wooden almirah. It was an ideal location for a young South Indian bachelor as many reputed South Indian eateries of the time, like Komala Vilas, Ramakrishna Lunch Home, Tara Mahal, South India Club, etc. were all within walking distance.
The Tamilian couple, Krishnan Mama and Lakshmi Mami, and their only son, Jeyraman, who was of my age, were extremely nice people and they treated me like a family member.
The long hours of load shedding experienced by Kolkatans during the eighties, especially in the peak of summer, found us sitting on the doorsteps of the house right on the street till late into the night discussing a wide range of subjects — Tamil movies, the Naxal movement, load shedding, trade unions, Metro Rail construction woes, etc.
With this brief description of my PG accommodation I come to the significant and historic aspect of 2/3 Sebak Baidya Street and the importance of my PG room in that house. That property belonged to the gentleman who had earned the epithet of The First Man of Rabindrasangeet and was also the first music director who introduced Rabindrasangeet successfully in films. I am talking about the great composer and singer par excellence, Pankaj Kumar Mullick (1905–1978).
Krishnan Mama proudly declared one night at our load shedding adda session that my room was used for rehearsal and adda by many singers, musicians, and artists of that period, and notable among them was Kundan Lal Saigal. I was thrilled to learn that because my eldest brother, Shyam Sundar, who was no more, was an ardent fan of Pankaj Mullick and K.L.Saigal. He had a collection of around 100 of their songs in 78 RPM and I recalled listening to those songs on the first model of HMV’s Gramophone Record Player. We still have all those old 78 RPM records well preserved, at my ancestral home in Guntur, Andhra Pradesh.
I recently stumbled upon the well-designed and documented Pankaj Mullick Music and Art Foundation website. Here, Pankaj Mullick is introduced as not only a singer and music composer but also an actor, a playwright, a writer, a teacher, an administrator, and above all a kind, gentle, magnanimous, and extremely humble person. He worked with the All India Radio for a remarkable 50 years, and had a long career in Indian films for close to 38 years. He is credited with nearly 5000 songs and compositions and nearly 150 films. Pankaj Mullick’s contribution to Indian films and Indian popular music is truly impressive and extraordinary.
He studied at the Scottish Church College which is affiliated to the University of Calcutta. He trained under Durgadas Bandopadhyay (1893-1943) for classical and light classical music. Significantly, in his late teens he trained under Dinendranath Tagore (1882-1935) who was the grandson of Dwijendranath Tagore, the eldest brother of Rabindranath Tagore.
Tagore's song Nemecche Aaj Prothom Badal became his first commercial recording, with the Kolkata based Videophone Company in 1926. He was only twenty-one. This was the first of many albums which made him a household name for Rabindrasangeet.
Pankaj Mullick set music to the recitation of Mahishasuramardhini, that is broadcast by All India Radio every Mahalaya morning. The program is an integral part of Bengal’s celebration of Durga and has had an uninterrupted run since 1931.
Pankaj Mullick is also known for conceptualising Sangeet Shikshar Ashar, a widely popular live music class he conducted for 47 years. The Foundation’s website records this unique achievement and highlights that there is no other parallel to this achievement across the world.
Luminaries like K.L.Saigal, S.D.Burman, Hemanta Mukherjee, Geeta Dutt, and Asha Bhosle sang under Pankaj Mullick’s music direction as did several other prominent artists from Bengal and the rest of the country. The movies he was associated with were in Bengali, Hindi, Urdu, and Tamil.
Interestingly, Pankaj Mullick, along with director Nitin Bose was instrumental in the introduction of playback singing in Indian cinema.
He was awarded the Padma Shri in 1970, followed by the Dadasaheb Phalke Award in 1972 for lifetime contribution to Indian cinema.
The Indian Postal Service released a postage stamp on his birth centenary in 2006 and. Doordarshan telecast a special music programme to commemorate the occasion. Five decades earlier, in 1959, it was he and Bharatanatyam danseuse Vyjayanthimala who were lead performers at the nationwide launch of the channel.
Pankaj Mullick resided in the 3 storied building next to the old house but unfortunately I could not meet him as he had passed away in 1978. I met his daughter and recall having very pleasant conversations with her. Subsequently, Mr. Krishnan moved to Chennai with his family and I also moved out of Sebak Baidya Street.
Today, his old residential address, 2/2 Sebak Baidya Street houses the Pankaj Mullick Music and Art Foundation, a non-profit organization engaged in the preservation, promotion, and propagation of the cultural heritage of India, with a focus on Bengal. It was established in 2005, the year of his birth centenary.
It began by archiving and digitizing all available works of Pankaj Mullick which included his legendary songs and compositions, his photographs, the scripts he wrote, the films he acted in, press clippings featuring him, documentaries on him, and more such material across mediums.
Some renditions by Pankaj Mullick which were until recently unheard have now been made available from the family's private collection in the form of a ten song album titled 'Pran Chaay', published by Pankaj Mullick Music and Art Foundation. The album has the Dadasaheb Phalke awardee singing Tagore's songs after altering the lyrics and tunes, reportedly approved by the poet himself.
The main activities of the Pankaj Mullick Music and Art Foundation are handled by Rajib Gupta and Jhinuk Gupta, who are the maternal grandson and granddaughter-in-law of Pankaj Mullick.
