Mahendra Kapoor: got his due only with the Mahabharat song

Mahendra Kapoor’s voice is synonymous with the theme song of Mahabharat. It provided him with a large fan base and proved to be one of his biggest hits. However, if you go through the list of his songs, you will discover that you have almost cherished all of them at some point in time. And that too, without being aware of the fact that they were sung by him.

The king of powerful voice

Mahendra Kapoor was a very versatile singer who sang the song across genres. But he was never clubbed with other playback singing legends. In Bollywood, there was a tradition that each actor got a playback singer as a ghost voice. The idea behind “ghost voice” was to maintain uniformity in actors’ voices consistent across films.

According to that tradition, Mahendra Kapoor mainly gave voice to Manoj Kumar and occasionally to others like Rajendra Kumar and Sunil Dutta, among others. That was probably why he was always underrated in the Bollywood industry.

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His strength in playback singing was his powerful voice. He never needed a sound system or filters. The pitch of his voice suited the patriotic and spiritual songs. But do you remember them? Maybe you don’t, but you must have listened to the songs. Let me remind you!

The first one is “Mere desh ki Dharti sona ugale” and the most remarkable is “Hai preet jahan ki reet sada” from Manoj Kumar’s “Purab Paschim.” In the top spiritual melodies list, his songs top the chart with “Ramchandra keh gaye siya se,” “Om jai jagdish hare,” “Chalo bulawa aaya hai,” and “Durga hai meri ma,” among others.

Chalo Ek Baar Fir Se Ajnabi
Har Dil Jo Pyar Karega
Kisi Patther Ki Murat Se
Na Muh Chupa Ke Jiyo
Neele Gagan Ke Tale
Tum Agar Sath Dene Ka Vada Karo
De Daaru De Daaru

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Lacked recognition

Mahendra Kapoor got three Filmfare awards for the best male playback singer for “Aur Nahin, Aur Nahin,” “Neele Gagan Ke Tale,” and “Chalo Ek Baar Fir Se,” and a national award for “Mere Desh Ki Dharti Sona Ugale.” In 1972, the Government of India conferred on him the title of “Padma Shri.”

While he was honoured many times in his career, most people failed to recognise him for a long time. They enjoyed the song but could not relate to it. All his songs are recognised either for the films in which they were sung or the actors who were the face of the song. However, it is the singer’s voice that has the greatest impact on the audience while watching the movie.

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Mahabharat gave him his due share

Mahabharat was broadcast at a time when television was becoming more accessible to the general public. B.R. Chopra’s masterpiece received a warm welcome on TV screens. And Mahabharat’s theme song proved to be the ‘icing on the cake.’ The song needed a loud and strong voice that was capable of instilling the essence of Mahabharat in the people’s hearts. And Mahendra Kapoor’s voice proved to be unparalleled for that song.

So, from that point on, Mahendra Kapoor gained the prominence and recognition he deserved. But it must be remembered that it was not only the Mahabharat title song that was his biggest achievement. His career is like a book, with each chapter more interesting than the previous one. As a result, he deserves to be recognised for all of the masterpiece melodies he sang and gave us to enjoy.