Filmmaker Kalpana Lajmi, best known for critically acclaimed films like Ek Pal, Rudaali and Darmiyaan, was all of 17 when she met the 45-year-old acclaimed poet-lyricist-musician and later, Dadasaheb Phalke, Padmashri and Padmabhushan awardee Dr Bhupen Hazarika. They parted company when he breathed his last at the age of 85 in 2011.
The couple, coming from wildly different backgrounds, defied social conventions and went through personal and political ups and downs that would perhaps have wrecked feebler relationships. While Lajmi dedicated her life to Hazarika’s well-being and the preservation of his work, he helped her explore her intellectual and artistic talents.
Lajmi writes in the foreword of her memoir, Bhupen Hazarika: As I Knew Him:
Forty years of an eventful, personal, tumultuous journey with Bhupen, marked by important socio-cultural and political events that deeply impacted our personalities, are what I want to talk about. Our nation’s influence on Bhupen and his artistic conscience and, in turn, Bhupen’s complete devotion to his art and uplift of the underprivileged and plea for regional recognition went hand in hand. I slowly realized I was always in love with Bhupen and Bhupen was always in love with the nation. I was always in love with his artistic genius and he was always in love with his native soil. I was always in love with his innocence whereas he was, till his last breath, torn with anguish,angst and inexplicable pain for the condition of his fellow beings,not only in eastern India but also in India and Bangladesh.Kalpana Lajmi, in Bhupen Hazarika: As I Knew Him
Bhupen Hazarika: As I Knew Him gives us a peek into the lives of a hugely talented man with a formidable legacy and an equally gifted woman who stood by him despite a mercurial nature (which sometimes manifested itself in abusive tantrums), and his reluctance to accept her as his companion.
Here’s an excerpt from the book:
Kalpana is Insulted
Year 1982. Ten years with Bhupen and my personality had begun to undergo a change. On one hand, I developed, thanks to his generosity, my intellectual freedom, but, on the other hand, there was no change in my financial freedom. By now I had learnt to think on my own, have my own views and would be constantly sparring with him, hating him when he used to consume alcohol. Yet I realized that I had nowhere to run. So, I programmed myself to accept him with his faults.
Those days, I was handling his events. It was very difficult to get him to raise his rates and I remember one incident vividly. I disliked two brokers, Netai-babu and Tochan Ghosh, who would exploit Bhupen thoroughly. They would take their commission but they would always cheat Bhupen of his meagre earnings. I don’t know whether Bhupen was under their spell, timid, indifferent or careless, but he would accept it without a murmur.
It was very frustrating. I tried explaining to Bhupen not to get drunk before going on stage. To change the same old repertoire of songs. For example, if he would sing in three localities in one evening, I would change the repertoire of songs in each locality so that there is variety to the performance.
Though I didn’t know Bengali, I would write out the captions in English, fix it to the pages and stand behind him night after night, turning the pages on the music stand in time, keeping pace with an impatient Bhupen.
He would be surrounded by fans and I alone would have to deal with the organizers and brokers and always return crestfallen, knowing Bhupen would not support me. How long was this to continue, I had begun to wonder. One afternoon, Netai-babu had brought some people who sat in the outer room. They were very crude and were bargaining senselessly. At one point I raised my voice and said in Hindi, ‘Yeh machhi bazaar nahin hai. Aap tameez se baat kijiye mere saath.’ (This is not a fish market! You better talk to me in a decent manner.) The party jumped up and hollered and shouted saying that I insulted them. I too shouted and threw the money back at them, saying, ‘Don’t you dare talk to me like that.’
They asked me who I was. ‘We want to speak to Bhupen-babu,’ they said.
I raised my voice even louder. ‘I will not allow Bhupen-babu to meet you. You will have to deal with me.’
Netai-babu said, ‘Barabari hochhe, Kalpana-di.’ (You are overdoing it.) And in one audacious move, he bypassed me and marched into Bhupen’s bedroom to complain. The next I knew, Bhupen had come out of his room.
I said, ‘Bhupsu, go in please. Let me handle this.’
To my utter astonishment, he said, ‘Stop it. Don’t behave like a fisherwoman.’ Such an insult coming from him, that too in front of the brokers who were trying to cheat him. Tears filled my eyes and I stormed out of the room.
Bhupen sat down and cajoled the party and spoke to them in Bengali, smiling, apologizing for my behaviour and promising to sing for them way below the price they had offered. They left victorious. By then it was 2 p.m. Kamla the maid had laid the table.
Bhupen came storming in, wagging his finger. ‘Do you know something? Don’t you dare continue working for me if you don’t understand the system over here. It is me, Bhupen Hazarika, they want. Not you.’ Surprised, I said, ‘But, Bhupen, I am trying to raise your price so that they understand your value and worth.’
He whirled around, lifted the container that was filled with boiled rice on the table and flung it at me. The rice dripped down my face and head. I was too stunned to react. I had never been exposed to such misbehaviour in my life.
Heaving and panting, he said, ‘Who do you think you are? Saala Bambaiya Bamun! Trying to commercialize me? Saala, after you have come into my life, Saraswati toh has gone, abhi tere wajeh se Lakshmi bhi bhaag jayegi.’
Something inside me snapped. I lifted the bowl of steaming fish curry from the table and threw it at him. He was so shocked that he stood still. His head, face and body were covered with fish curry. The servants had come running by then. Kamla held me back and Subodh the manservant fell at Bhupen’s feet to calm him down. Without a word, he went into his bedroom and locked the door.
I sat down on the floor and wept like I have never done before, confused, frightened. I told Kamla and Subodh,
I can’t go back to Bombay. I can’t go back to my parents and that horrible life. I have never faced such humiliation. I don’t know what to do with myself. I am dependent on Bhupen-da.Kalpana Lajmi, in Bhupen Hazarika: As I Knew Him
I was terribly confused and at that moment my life took an unexpected turn. The telephone rang. Subodh answered the call and said to me, ‘There is a call from one H.P. Baruah’s residence.’
I didn’t know who he was. I picked up the phone and a sophisticated voice said, ‘This is Hemen Barua here. Who am I speaking to?’
I replied in English, ‘I am Kalpana Lajmi.’
‘Oh, are you Bhupen’s secretary?’
I said, ‘Well, sort of.’
‘Can I speak with Bhupen, please?’
I was hesitant. I didn’t want to face Bhupen. So I replied, ‘Please hold the line. I will try.’ Subodh knocked on the door and finally Bhupen emerged, sulking. Upon being told that it was a call from H.P. Baruah, his demeanour changed. He was laughing and joking in Assamese and spoke for a good ten minutes. It did not make any sense to me. In any case, I had stopped trying to make sense of Bhupen’s mercurial mood changes. I left the house without telling him while he continued to speak to Baruah. I took a cycle rickshaw up to the lake at Rabindra Sarobar and sat there till sundown, watching people go by.
(Bhupen Hazarika: As I Knew Him by Kalpana Lajmi; HarperCollins Publishers; Rs 499.)
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