Mukesh Chand Mathur (22 July 1923 – 27 August 1976), known simply as Mukesh, was an Indian playback singer, one of the three great male voices of the golden age of Hindi film music with Mohammed Rafi and Kishore Kumar. He was the singing voice of Raj Kapoor for nearly thirty years. His slightly nasal voice, plain and full of feeling, was unequalled in songs of sorrow and longing.
Quick Facts
| Full name | Mukesh Chand Mathur |
| Born | 22 July 1923, Delhi |
| Died | 27 August 1976, Detroit, United States (aged 53) |
| Occupation | Playback singer |
| Years active | 1941–1976 |
| Known for | Awara Hoon, Mera Joota Hai Japani, Sab Kuch Seekha Humne, Kahin Door Jab Din Dhal Jaye, Kabhi Kabhie Mere Dil Mein |
| Awards | National Film Award for Best Male Playback Singer (1974); four Filmfare Awards |
| Spouse | Saral Trivedi |
| Children | Nitin Mukesh and others |
Early Life
He was born in Delhi into a Kayastha family, the sixth of ten children of an engineer. A music teacher came to the house to teach his sister, and the boy listened from the next room. He left school after the tenth class and worked for a few months in the public works department, singing at gatherings of friends.
Discovery
The actor Motilal, a distant relative, heard him sing at his sister’s wedding and took him to Bombay, where he arranged for him to be trained by a classical teacher. He was tried first as an actor who sang, in Nirdosh (1941), without success.
His first hit as a playback singer was “Dil jalta hai to jalne de” in Pehli Nazar (1945), composed by Anil Biswas and filmed on Motilal. He sang it in so exact an imitation of his idol, K. L. Saigal, that Saigal is said to have asked when he had recorded the song. The composer Naushad later helped him to find a manner of his own.
Raj Kapoor
He sang for Raj Kapoor in the actor’s first film as director, Aag (1948), and thereafter in nearly all of them, with the composers Shankar and Jaikishan and the lyricist Shailendra.
- “Awara hoon” in Awara (1951), which was sung from Moscow to Istanbul to Beijing
- “Mera joota hai Japani” in Shree 420 (1955)
- “Sab kuch seekha humne” in Anari (1959), for which he won his first Filmfare Award
- “Dost dost na raha” in Sangam and “Jeena yahan marna yahan” in Mera Naam Joker
When he died, Raj Kapoor said: “I have lost my voice.”
Other Songs
He also sang memorably for Dilip Kumar, in Andaz, Yahudi and Madhumati (“Suhana safar”), and for Manoj Kumar and others.
- “Kahin door jab din dhal jaye” in Anand (1971)
- “Chandan sa badan” in Saraswatichandra
- “Ek pyar ka nagma hai” in Shor
- “Kai baar yun bhi dekha hai” in Rajnigandha, which won him the National Film Award in 1974
- “Kabhi kabhie mere dil mein” in Kabhi Kabhie (1976), a Filmfare Award given after his death
He recorded about thirteen hundred songs, far fewer than his great contemporaries. He was not a technically versatile singer and knew it; music directors used him when a song needed sincerity above all. He also recorded the whole of the Ramcharitmanas of Tulsidas.
In the early 1950s he lost several years trying again to become an actor and a film producer. The films failed, and he returned to singing.
Personal Life
In 1946, on his twenty-third birthday, he married Saral Trivedi, the daughter of a wealthy Gujarati family that opposed the match; the wedding took place in a temple with Motilal’s help. They had a son, Nitin Mukesh, who became a playback singer, and daughters. The actor Neil Nitin Mukesh is his grandson.
He was known in the industry as a gentle, generous and devout man without enemies.
Death
In the summer of 1976 he went on a concert tour of the United States and Canada with Lata Mangeshkar. On 27 August, in Detroit, he had a heart attack as he was getting ready for the evening’s show and died on the way to hospital. Lata Mangeshkar brought his body home.
He belongs with Mohammed Rafi, Kishore Kumar and Manna Dey among the voices by which an era of Indian film is remembered.
Featured image: Mukesh in January 1956. Photo by the Photo Division, Government of India, in the public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
