Aamir, Nasir, Tahir, Tariq, Mansoor, Amjad: Movies, Masti, Modernity, Flashback 7

To remind you, Aamir is indeed Aamir Khan, Amjad is definitely Gabbar Singh, and the triple M above is to acknowledge that it was Akshay Manwani’s biographical book on the cinema of Nasir Hussain that got me delving into the period of about 15 years, when I interacted with the Hussain Khans (first five) and the bare Khan (last, but the most imposing personality). Actually, Mansoor did not use his middle name, so he can be called a ‘Khan’ too! Tahir stands for Nasir’s (younger) brother, Tahir Hussain.

Nasir Hussain (1931-2002) was already a in my favourites list much before I met him. Now, the story of my interactions with him is picked-up from the last paragraph of Flashback No. 6.

One track, ‘Tere liye’, was a clear lift from ABBA’s ‘Mamma mia’ and another, ‘Tum kya jaano’, was reprised from Sholay’s ‘Mehboba’, which in turn, was a plagiarised from Egyptian-Greek singer Demis Roussos’s ‘Say you love me’. However, it was the resurgent Mohammed Rafi, who won the National Award for Best Playback Singer for the dulcet, smooth as silk and heart-rending lamentation, at the same time, ‘Chaand mera dil’. Can you imagine Hum Kiseese Kum Naheen without these numbers?

After Hum Kiseese Kum Naheen, Nasir was to make Zamane Ko Dikhana Hai. And thereby hangs a very unlucky chapter in my film career. I was rightfully sore at my roles in Yaadon Ki Baarat and HKKN being excised completely, and trimmed to a token presence, respectively. Add to that the peeve of having my (a proficient dubbing-artiste’s) own voice being dubbed by someone else, in a Hussain’s Anamika. Two other films that failed to push my career forward were Mr. Romeo, produced by Nasir’s pal Subodh Mukerji, and Ki Jeeta Koi Hara, directed by Mukerji’s brother-in-law, Sameer Ganguly, the wiz kid who had directed hits like Shagird and Sharmeelee.

The former, which had a noticeable part allotted to me, flopped on its own (de)merits, while the latter, released some six years after it began under the title Waada, with Manmohan Desai wielding the megaphone, was mauled to extinction by the censors, during the Internal Emergency of 1975-77, when the vaguest hint of violence or sex or liquor or smuggling, had to be deleted or scratched out on the film or substituted. That it was released around the same time as Sholay rubbed proverbial salt in our wounds!

Would you believe that they equated the nomenclature of a corporate gang boss as ‘President’ being tantamount to a reference to the country’s highest political office bearer, and that word had to be erased from visibility and audibility some 100 times over the course of the film! Both had Shashi Kapor as the hero, and one take-away from the two outings was the opportunity to work with one of the prime members of ‘ELGA’ (the Extra-ordinary League of Gentlemen Actors), an acquaintance that I have cherished for 40 years.

I now wanted, and almost demanded, good roles from all three: Nasir Hussain, Tahir Hussain and the Subodh Mukerji Productions (SMP) camp. All three proved pipe-dreams, and how! Tahir Hussain made Khoon Ki Pukar with Vinod Khanna, a dacoit drama, and told me bluntly, “Do you fancy yourself as a horse-riding bandit?” (I didn’t, but neither did I fancy myself as a villain’s henchman, who I portrayed in KJKH). He also made Zakhmee, a brothers-against-villain vengeance tale, and offered me a role that was to occupy all of two shots. I bluntly refused. He was enraged. How dare I turn down a role offered by Tahir Hussain? “Tahir Saahab,” I explained, “you have been around for long enough in the film industry to realise that this role has about a 1% chance of remaining in the final cut of your film.” Nothing would assuage his feelings of hurt. As a last-minute substitute, Raj Khandelwal, his Production Executive, was asked to don make-up and costume and play the bit that had been doled out to me. It was deleted from the final cut of Zakhmee.

ZKDH was shot, and shot, and shot. Every time visited Nasir Hussain’s office, Production Executive Dharamvir Varma reassured me that my role would come up soon. Meanwhile, my 15-day role in Ladke Baapse Badke (SMP) was re-designed to a two-scenes/two shots role, the script now re-written to accommodate a youngster, who replaced me (the school-teacher) as the character who unites the warring school rival hero duo. This had me livid, but there was little one could done in the Mumbai film industry in situations like these, except sulk. All eyes (my four bespectacled eyes, that is) were now on ZKDH. And then I was invited to a preview of the edited first half of the film.

It was almost two hours long. Where the projection ended, there was to be an intermission. Was Nasir Hussain making a four-hour film? He had touched three...but four? Even Sholay was not four hours long! After the screening, I rushed to Varma, and he got the hint. “You see, Siraj, NasirSaahab is going to have five villains appear on screen in the second half, you know... in Special Appearance. Four of them are established names. And guess what? One is going to be you!” My expectations were sky high, even as they were hanging by a thread now. Second half? When would it be shot? Would it be shot? The film appeared complete in its present state!

You guessed it. There weren’t five villains in the ‘second half’, in Special or Ordinary Appearance. I was not given a chance to face the camera at all in ZKDH. Changing the script, NasirSaahab now had Tariq arriving out f the blue (HongKong), on a helicopter, as the long-lost illegitimate son of the villain (Amjad Khan), out to settle scores with his own father. ZKDH showed signs of a waning Nasir Hussain, and realisation dawned on me that this was the end of the road as far as expecting roles from NH Films, TV Films and SMP was concerned.

The film bombed, and all I can recall are five song tracks by Asha Bhosle, Shailendra Singh, R.D. Burman, and the resurgent Mohammed Rafi. Rafi’s ‘Poochho na yaar kya hua’, picturised on Rishi Kapoor, unheard by most persons till then, was sung at my behest by singer Prof. Ashok Khare, in his stage tribute to the legendary singer, who had died in 1980, before the release of the film a year or more later. I compèred the show. And, as a consolation prize, I did the voicing for the radio programmes, produced, as was to be expected, by my Guru, Ameen Sayani.

Word had reached me earlier that Subhash Ghai wanted to do a HKKN-like number in Karz, later to be trumpeted as ‘Om shanti Om’. I cannot recall what went wrong, but I ended-up not working on that song. Maybe it was because but roles did not entice me any longer, and producers were not willing to pay much for a non-recognised outsource. So, why should I continue doing something that my heart was not really in? By the mid-80s, my days of arranging mass crowds of interactive teens and twenties for song-and-dance numbers were all but over. Fourteen years was a long time in the game, even if I was involved only with less than fourteen films in this period.

Meanwhile, a young man called Aamir Khan was proving a good assistant to his uncle on films like Manzil Manzil and Zabardast (he could in no way be held accountable for their failure at the box-office), had even acted in films like Holi (1984) and Raakh (delayed release in 1989). His uncle, Nasir Hussain, was planning to make a big film with him in the lead. Cousin Mansoor, for his part, was a techie, having established a pioneering video studio in Mumbai. Though Mansoor was credited as Associate Director on Zabardast (produced by Mushir-Riaz) Nobody had prophesied or even envisioned, at least at that stage, that Mansoor would direct Qayamat Se Qayamat Tak, and it would make a star out of Aamir Khan.

Coming-up: Flashback 8