Two great ladies

By Dr Upul Wijayawardhana

Sunday 6th February was a very significant day where two great ladies concerned; one completed her journey in this world after an illustrious career and the other created yet another record. Whilst India, bid farewell to its Nightingale, the United Kingdom started celebrating Queen Elizabeth’s Platinum Jubilee, a feat not achieved by any British monarch before her.

There were no official celebrations in the UK though Princess Elizabeth’s accession to the throne, following the death of her beloved father King George VI, occurred on 6 February 1952. Obviously, it is a bitter-sweet day for Her Majesty, Platinum Jubilee celebrations are to be held in June when there would be a four-day Jubilee bank holiday weekend, from Thursday 2 June to Sunday 5 June. The British government has promised a “once-in-a-generation show” that will “mix the best of British ceremonial splendour and pageantry with cutting edge artistic and technological displays”. Hence, there will be future opportunities to dwell on this subject.

However, though she spent the day privately, Queen Elizabeth issued a message on Sunday marking the 70th anniversary of her reign, wherein the most important statement was her “sincere wish” that Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall, will have the title of Queen Consort when Prince Charles becomes King. We do not know what King Charles would become, as he can choose any regnal name, but we are sure to have a Queen Camilla although the previous expectation was that she would be Princess Consort. It is interesting that the Queen signed off the message to her subjects, re-dedicating herself to serve the nation: “Your servant, Elizabeth R.”

Lata Mangeshkar, born in the central Indian city of Indore on 28 September 1929, became a cultural icon and a national treasure of India by being the best “playback singer” of all time. She became yet another victim of Covid-19 and succumbed to pneumonia on 05 Feb., and was cremated the following day. Her father was a singer, theatre actor and producer of musical plays in the Marathi but unfortunately lost his fortunes. After his death, Lata with her mother and four younger siblings, all of whom became musicians later, moved to Bombay. She never had a formal education and acted in a few films before taking to singing, her debut being in the 1943 Marathi film Gajabahu. However, she got recognition only in 1949 when she sang in the film Mahal, and thereafter she had a meteoric rise. She sang not only film songs but also devotional songs and once held the Guinness record for the most recorded artiste. She had sung over 30,000 songs in 36 Indian languages and a few foreign languages including Sinhala. She was the first Indian to have a concert in the Royal Albert Hall, London in 1974 and we had the good fortune to listen to that heavenly voice there.

Perhaps, a short article like this cannot do justice to Lata Mangeshkar’s numerous achievements and accolades received and, therefore, would limit myself to two songs which has the most relevance to us.

The first has to be the memorable song in the film “Sada Sulang” directed by T Somasekaran and screened in 1955. “Sri Lanka Ma Priyadara Jaya Bhoomi”, a patriotic song written by Ananda Samarakoon to the music of S Dhakshinamoorthy was sung by Lata with such emotion and feeling, as if she had understood the meaning. At a time like this, when the country is at the bottom of despair, sentiments expressed so beautifully in that song ring so true: “Kohi giyeda ma dama, pembara ma petawunwe” (Where have you gone deserting me, my beloved children). We are yet to honour Ananda Samarakoon properly but it is another story. It ends with “Noenda mara ninde ada, enu enu pibide”. Can there be a better rallying cry for today than the climax of that song: ‘Refrain from the deadly stupor, come, come wake up!’

When Lata sang “Ye Mere Watan ke Logon” (Ye, the people of my land), a haunting and soulful tribute written by Kavi Pradeep to slain Indian soldiers in the 1962 war with China, at the Republic Day on 26 January 1963, it moved the entire audience including India’s first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru to tears. It is not surprising as my eyes get wet, every time, I listen to this song though my understanding of Hindi is very limited.

We have had a much bigger success eradicating terrorism but I am yet to hear a memorable song like that for our war heroes. Is it that we are less patriotic than Indians? Perhaps. In fact, in the hard-hitting editorial “Seeking justice: Church sets example” (The Island, 5 February) poses this question:

“On seeing a large number of police personnel taking part in yesterday’s parade with the IGP flanking President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, one remembered the massacre of 600 policemen who surrendered to the LTTE on the orders of the late President Ranasinghe Premadasa in 1990. Those hapless police personnel would have survived if they had fought back, but they had to follow orders in the name of ‘peace’ and perish. The LTTE bundled them into vehicles, took them into the jungle and executed them. Have the police ever conducted a special commemorative ceremony for those slain personnel?”

Lata is gone to sing in heaven. Will someone, someday sing “Ye Mere Watan ke Logon” (Ye, the people of my land) for our dead heroes?