I was young but I still remember everything. We had a small radio lying on the top of a cupboard in our rectangular gallery. It was near the window of our small kitchen and every morning, my father would play his treasured cassettes on it. Every morning, I’d hear my maa hum to the songs, they’d later term ‘evergreen’. Now that we have a Carvaan, we still recreate those moments but the kitchen is big and open and the gallery is just not there anymore, nor am I young.
One of our beloved artists to play were Jagjit and Chitra, a beautiful couple who brought Ghazals out of the rooms of elites into the ears of the general public. The very Jagjit and Chitra who earned the sobriquet of the ‘King and Queen of Ghazals’.
Their love story had always been my favourite. They met in a recording studio to record a jingle for an advertisement with Chitra refusing to sing with him because of his heavy voice. But maybe this heavy voice brought them together for Jagjit went on to ask Chitra’s hand in marriage from her ex-husband. Maybe Chitra was the ‘Ghana Saya’ in the ‘Dhoop’ of Jagjit’s ‘Zindagi’.
The remarkable couple went on to give us beautiful melodies, ranging from themes of sorrow to pure love. Their voices alone could make you feel loved, for they were so in love with eachother too.
In dono ke beech ka ‘Qarar’ inhe yaad ho na ho, hume toh hai.
But the loss of their son Vivek caused Chitra to withdrew from music. She stopped singing and once for all, we were depraved of her sweet voice. The couple gave up on music for a year and that was the last time Chitra ever sang. They had barely recovered from this shock that Chitra’s daughter Monica died by suicide, leaving her two sons behind with a guilty Chitra.
Bin ‘Chithi’, bin ‘Sandes’, Jagjit left for the ‘Des’ where he finally found his peace in 2011, increasing Chitra’s misery and putting an end to their reign on the Ghazal mehekma of India. I remember my dad replaying ‘Wo Kaagaz ki Kashti, Wo Baarish ka Paani’ that time.
‘Zakhm’ toh honge, par Chitra ji ‘Numaish’ nahin karti hongi. Par chhupaye chupte nahin kuch gamm, namm aankhein aur muskurate chehre aksar sach bayaan kar hi dete hain.
Remarkable, charismatic; words fall short because they were everything. Inhe bhool jayein hum itne bewafa toh nahin.
The voices of Jagjit and Chitra still echo in our home, with my father playing his beloved Carvaan, with my mother’s same hum in the kitchen, with my brother singing in between and me? I smile at them from the corner.
Fin.
The Scorned Persephone 