By Ram

What makes Rafi Saheb the ONE and ONLY is a question I have been asking myself all these years.

Probing and guessing galore ! Is it his inimitable voice ? His range – from the deepest bass to the highest octave defying pitch ? His ability to harness the right feelings for the right score ? His effortless ability to emote his voice to suit the personality of on-screen characters?
His divinely aligned stars which graced his voice with the immortal music of the likes of Naushad Saheb & S.D.BurmanDa or soul-stirring lyrics by Kaifi Azmi, Hasrat Jaipuri, Raja Mehndi Ali Khan etc ?

Posing the above queries makes one’s inquiry quiet music-centric – comprehensive though. And why not. After all in plain vanilla terms he was a professional and an accomplished playback singer.

Or is there something much deeper to this phenomenon called Mohammed Rafi. What to say of a person who does not have any one person pointing a finger at him for any aberration in his character or behavior.

Humble to the core that, even when there were differences with a noted music director and on another occasion with a leading female playback singer, he never allowed such situations to escalate; even though it was the other party that was wholly in the wrong.

Now , if this isn’t a sign of a realized soul , what else is it ?

There are instances galore about his heart reaching out to the poor and needy. Ever too gentle and soft-spoken, he remained a committed family man till the very end.
Events surrounding him lending true life to his songs are several – notably the song ” Babul Ki Duvayen Lethi Jaa” (film: NeelKamal) which was recorded at the time of his daughter’s marriage.

On July 31, 1980 – the date of his untimely end – I guess all the Gods in the Universe, unable to curb their emotions, must have burst into tears. For, on that day it rained torrentially in Mumbai.

Though no official holiday was declared, offices saw staff vacating their seats, shopkeepers downing their shutters and all of them descending on the streets, braving the weather, joining lakhs and lakhs of people accompanying the mortal remains of Rafi Saheb on his final journey.

So drawing ourselves back to the original question . What makes the longing for Rafi Saheb so unstoppable ?

While my search for the answer is still on…….it is gradually dawning on me that he is that one Child of God who took upon himself the task of spreading unconditional love on this earth with his divine voice.

No wonder he sang : “Sau Baras Ki Zindagi Se Achche Hain , Pyaar Ke Do Chaar Din”

This blog was published on Wednesday, December 24th, 2014 at 12:10 pm and is filed under Meri Awaaz Suno. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.