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It all started with a wish to don a Banarasi sari and sing in public again — a seemingly small request, but one that led to a performance to remember. When 88-year-old Zarina Begum took the stage at New Delhi’s Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts last week, many in the audience were transported to the days of the Raj when she used to be the soul of mehfils in the princely courts of Nanpara, Mehmoodabad, Rampur and Awadh.
At the end of the concert, a sort of despondency filled the hearts of the people — Zarina Begum will take her craft to the grave. She hasn’t passed on her mantle to anyone, not even her daughter. “When she goes, the 500 compositions that she used to sing will go with her,” says Manjari Chaturvedi, founder of not-for-profit Sufi Kathak Foundation and the person who brought Zarina Begum to New Delhi. “In her days, a mehfil singer was looked down upon. For some reason they were equated with nautch girls and tawaifs, which was a false notion. Zarina Begum wanted to keep her daughter away from that shame.”
The singer belonged to an entirely different age, so vastly different from her current wheelchair-bound existence. When I meet the aged star, her eyes look clouded and the vitality has all but ebbed away. As her son-in-law Mohammed Naved lifts her from the bed and puts her in the wheelchair so that she can pose for photos, she breaks into a ghazal made famous by Begum Akhtar, Deewana banana hai toh deewana bana de. Chaturvedi notices the spark and asks, “Ab thoda mood ban raha hai na?” As she hums another line from the song, the octogenarian sighs: “Often at night I hum this tune and cry.” A fry cry from the time when Zarina Begum had all of Awadh at her feet.
“When she used to sing at mehfils, people would be so mesmerised that they wouldn’t know when one day melted into another,” says Naved. Filmmaker Muzaffar Ali, who used to hear her at family mehfils and later recorded songs with her in 1996 for the television series Husn-e-Jaana, says it was her wide repertoire that made her so popular. “She could sing traditional folk, classical and semi-classical very well,” he says. “She used to sing many compositions of the Nawab of Rampur, Raza Ali Khan sahab.”
The Begum, who comes from a family of male musicians, broke several conventions on her journey to fame. “The transmission of knowledge within different communities of hereditary male musicians is traditionally extremely patriarchal,” says Saba Dewan who first met the singer in 2003 while researching for a film on thumri singers. “In her family, the women were confined behind the purdah and were expected to essay conventional roles.”
Shehenshah Hussain, Zarina Begum’s father, however, encouraged her and became her first teacher. He also introduced her to Begum Akhtar. “My nana knew Begum Akhtar very well; in fact he would bring her to Nanpara for concerts. My mother was 12 or so when she heard Begum Akhtar for the first time and she was mesmerised,” says daughter Rubina Khatoon. Begum Akhtar heard the young girl at a mehfil in Bairaj. “After that, Ammi and Begum Akhtar would regularly visit each other,” says Khatoon. Zarina then met Qurban Hussain, who played the tabla with Begum Akhtar. “They both fell in love with each other’s art,” says Khatoon of her parents.
Many perceive a sense of intimacy as well as melancholy in the styles of both Begum Akhtar and Zarina Begum. “Begum Akhtar wasn’t just her teacher, she was her idol,” says Ustad Iqbal Ahmed Khan, khalifa of the Delhi gharana. He was six years old when Zarina visited his home with her father in the 1960s to learn the nuances of the Delhi gharana. “She stayed at Haji Hotel near Jama Masjid, but spent the entire day learning from my uncle, Ustad Hilal Ahmed Khan. Bahut riyaaz karti thi woh,” he remembers.
In her heyday, Zarina lived in a sprawling haveli in Lucknow. “Not just that, the Raja of Nanpara had gifted her 700 bighas of land. Over time, her relatives usurped her property,” says Naved. Things started going downhill 20 years ago when her by-now dilapidated haveli collapsed. By this time, the concerts had stopped coming her way too. Today, she lives in a tin shed which doesn’t even have a proper roof. Indeed, as the singer herself mumbles, “Ek kamre ki mayoosi mein tanaha baithi hoon main.”
At the end of the concert, a sort of despondency filled the hearts of the people — Zarina Begum will take her craft to the grave. She hasn’t passed on her mantle to anyone, not even her daughter. “When she goes, the 500 compositions that she used to sing will go with her,” says Manjari Chaturvedi, founder of not-for-profit Sufi Kathak Foundation and the person who brought Zarina Begum to New Delhi. “In her days, a mehfil singer was looked down upon. For some reason they were equated with nautch girls and tawaifs, which was a false notion. Zarina Begum wanted to keep her daughter away from that shame.”
The singer belonged to an entirely different age, so vastly different from her current wheelchair-bound existence. When I meet the aged star, her eyes look clouded and the vitality has all but ebbed away. As her son-in-law Mohammed Naved lifts her from the bed and puts her in the wheelchair so that she can pose for photos, she breaks into a ghazal made famous by Begum Akhtar, Deewana banana hai toh deewana bana de. Chaturvedi notices the spark and asks, “Ab thoda mood ban raha hai na?” As she hums another line from the song, the octogenarian sighs: “Often at night I hum this tune and cry.” A fry cry from the time when Zarina Begum had all of Awadh at her feet.
“When she used to sing at mehfils, people would be so mesmerised that they wouldn’t know when one day melted into another,” says Naved. Filmmaker Muzaffar Ali, who used to hear her at family mehfils and later recorded songs with her in 1996 for the television series Husn-e-Jaana, says it was her wide repertoire that made her so popular. “She could sing traditional folk, classical and semi-classical very well,” he says. “She used to sing many compositions of the Nawab of Rampur, Raza Ali Khan sahab.”
The Begum, who comes from a family of male musicians, broke several conventions on her journey to fame. “The transmission of knowledge within different communities of hereditary male musicians is traditionally extremely patriarchal,” says Saba Dewan who first met the singer in 2003 while researching for a film on thumri singers. “In her family, the women were confined behind the purdah and were expected to essay conventional roles.”
Shehenshah Hussain, Zarina Begum’s father, however, encouraged her and became her first teacher. He also introduced her to Begum Akhtar. “My nana knew Begum Akhtar very well; in fact he would bring her to Nanpara for concerts. My mother was 12 or so when she heard Begum Akhtar for the first time and she was mesmerised,” says daughter Rubina Khatoon. Begum Akhtar heard the young girl at a mehfil in Bairaj. “After that, Ammi and Begum Akhtar would regularly visit each other,” says Khatoon. Zarina then met Qurban Hussain, who played the tabla with Begum Akhtar. “They both fell in love with each other’s art,” says Khatoon of her parents.
Many perceive a sense of intimacy as well as melancholy in the styles of both Begum Akhtar and Zarina Begum. “Begum Akhtar wasn’t just her teacher, she was her idol,” says Ustad Iqbal Ahmed Khan, khalifa of the Delhi gharana. He was six years old when Zarina visited his home with her father in the 1960s to learn the nuances of the Delhi gharana. “She stayed at Haji Hotel near Jama Masjid, but spent the entire day learning from my uncle, Ustad Hilal Ahmed Khan. Bahut riyaaz karti thi woh,” he remembers.
In her heyday, Zarina lived in a sprawling haveli in Lucknow. “Not just that, the Raja of Nanpara had gifted her 700 bighas of land. Over time, her relatives usurped her property,” says Naved. Things started going downhill 20 years ago when her by-now dilapidated haveli collapsed. By this time, the concerts had stopped coming her way too. Today, she lives in a tin shed which doesn’t even have a proper roof. Indeed, as the singer herself mumbles, “Ek kamre ki mayoosi mein tanaha baithi hoon main.”
