Social concerns of India's nightingale Lata Mangeshkar

Pramod Ranjan

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Oct 20, 2022, 1:56:41 PM10/20/22

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Playback singer Lata Mangeshkar was the uncrowned queen of Indian music for over seven decades. Her songs were heard and admired not only in India but also in many other countries including Pakistan and Bangladesh. This article is about her social concerns and political leanings. At the level of thought, she was close to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), which is infamous for its Nazi-like ideology. Many incidents of her life show that she preferred communal politics over secularism. She also kept away from the Dalit issues.
- Pramod Ranjan
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https://docs.google.com/document/d/1E8EBFqxloVOIj290TdPuUSZ9CKjg351l/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=105607178039054834913&rtpof=true&sd=true

Osman Sher

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Oct 20, 2022, 10:59:13 PM10/20/22

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Art, that evokes inner sensation and awakens tender feelings, is a form of spiritualism. Its message is like that of Bhakti or Sufism, i.e., sulh-e kull or peace for all and animosity with none.

In its midst, exclusiveness certainly looks out of place, especially when one is not only earning enormous respect of those who are considered as 'others' but also is being benefited materially from them.

According to the historian, Arnold Toynbee, “the choice (between competition and cooperation) is deliberate in human beings, and in us it is bound up with the human sense of the difference and antithesis between right and wrong and between good and evil”.

Lata Mangeshkar was a human being. Probably, she chose the powers “inimical to the wellbeing of the world” and not those that “are struggling to better it”.

Osman Sher

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kapoor kapil

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Oct 21, 2022, 8:43:53 AM10/21/22

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It appears only Brahmin haters are milk-washed, just as Jew haters were. Being a Marxist or being close to Marxists is the ticket to heaven- being even a Hindu sympathetic to RSS is the road to Liberal Hell.

Regards - kapil kapoor

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JanVikalp

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Oct 21, 2022, 9:46:01 AM10/21/22

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From: Anirudh Deshpande <anir...@gmail.com>

Dear Pramod,

I enjoyed your article on Lata. Always wonder how different from her was Rafi, Manna, Talat, Mukesh and Kishore. Examine the secular views of Dilip Kumar in contrast. In fact, she is a blot on the otherwise hitherto secular character of Bollywood. Now the place is crowded with Hindu communalists.

Best,

Anirudh.

On Friday, October 21, 2022 at 6:13:53 PM UTC+5:30 kapoor kapil wrote:

It appears only Brahmin haters are milk-washed, just as Jew haters were. Being a Marxist or being close to Marxists is the ticket to heaven- being even a Hindu sympathetic to RSS is the road to Liberal Hell.
Regards - kapil kapoor

Sent from Yahoo Mail on Android

On Thu, 20 Oct 2022 at 23:26, Pramod Ranjan
<in...@janvikalp.org> wrote:

Playback singer Lata Mangeshkar was the uncrowned queen of Indian music for over seven decades. Her songs were heard and admired not only in India but also in many other countries including Pakistan and Bangladesh. This article is about her social concerns and political leanings. At the level of thought, she was close to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), which is infamous for its Nazi-like ideology. Many incidents of her life show that she preferred communal politics over secularism. She also kept away from the Dalit issues.
- Pramod Ranjan
See the Article Here :
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1E8EBFqxloVOIj290TdPuUSZ9CKjg351l/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=105607178039054834913&rtpof=true&sd=true

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Sushant Mishra

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Oct 21, 2022, 9:46:57 AM10/21/22

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Nazi like ideology has a counterpart in Stalin. But no need to remind anybody as Goeble's truth corresponds to the Stalinist attemps to fable and children story character creations.

Some chose to ignore that Hindus also have a right to exist...Ignorance is bliss. Ideologically chosen ignorance is euphoria. In euphoria, people often amnesiac about the rights of others. Hindu is the other for Stalinists. Nazis were supported by Pope etc. But selective ignorance is euphoric.

Only Lata Mangeshkar is to be blamed.

regards

Sushant

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Pramod Ranjan

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Oct 21, 2022, 10:05:11 AM10/21/22

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@ Kapil Kapoor, Sushant Mishra Ji

आपकी इन टिप्प्णियों से हैरान हूं। इस लेख पर अगर आरोप ही लगाना था तो इसके दलित-बहुजनवादी को लेकर लगाते! इसकी लानत-मानत आम्बेडकरवादी कह कर करते!! इसमें आप मार्क्सवाद/स्तालिनवाद को कहां से ढूंढ लाए? सचमुच मार्क्सवाद का प्रेत उसके विरोधियों के सर चढ़कर बोलता है। मार्क्सवादी मित्रों को आपकी टिप्पणियों से खुश होना चाहिए।

वैसे, ब्राह्मण के ब्राह्मण बने रहने और ब्राह्मणवाद को बढ़वा देना, हिंदू को हिंदू बने रहने और सांप्रदायिकता को बढ़वा देने का 'अधिकार' नहीं है। इसकी आलोचना हर वह विचारधारा करेगी, जो एक स्वस्थ समाज की पक्षधर है।

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Dr Pramod Ranjan
Assistant Professor
Rabindranath Tagore School of Languages and Cultural Studies,
Assam University, INDIA

+919811884495
Pronoun: he
Books
शिमला डायरी
बहुजन साहित्य की प्रस्तावना
The Case for Bahujan Literature
हिंदी साहित्येतिहास का बहुजन पक्ष
धर्म और विश्वदृष्टि (पेरियार के भाषण व लेख)
जाति व्यवस्था और पितृसत्ता (पेरियार के भाषण व लेख)

Anand Patwardhan

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Oct 21, 2022, 10:59:14 AM10/21/22

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i always opposed lata's politics and world view while she was alive, just as i oppose the likes of amitabh bacchan and anupam kher for being rank opportunists ever willing to kiss arse no matter how saffron. no point needling the dead tho, unless you are pointing at those still alive.

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Osman Sher

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Oct 21, 2022, 11:23:20 PM10/21/22

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I have to take another thread from the article of Mr. Pramod Ranjan, which relates to the history of India, where he says that Lata Mangeshkar sang, being deeply immersed, Savarkar’s song, which “communalizes Shivaji: Her Hindu nrisangha prabho Shivajiraja”.

In this regard, there are two historical myths:

1, Shivaji was anti Muslim and represented Hinduism’s revival, and

2. He was almost of the stature of the Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb.

1. Shivaji’s grandfather had named his two sons Shahji and Sharifji after a Muslim saint named Shah Sharif, whom he deeply venerated. Like his grandfather, Shivaji also remained respectful to Islam during his campaigns. Khafi Khan, the historian of the time of Aurangzeb, who has termed Shivaji in his writings as ‘a sharp son of the devil’, and ‘a father of fraud’, mentions about his special virtues as follows: “But he made it a rule that wherever his followers went plundering, they should do no harm to the mosques, the Book of God, or the women of any one. Whenever a copy of the sacred Quran came into his hands, he treated it with respect, and gave it to some of his Musalman followers. When the women of any Hindu or Muhammadan were taken prisoners by his men, and they had no friend to protect them, he watched over them until their relations came with a suitable ransom to buy their liberty”.

2. Shivaji’s struggle was not a religious movement, nor did it represent an effort for revivalism of Hindu culture. It was basically an armed struggle to establish a regional kingdom. For that purpose, Shivaji had to contend with the Deccan Sultanates as well as with the Mughal might. Contests for territory have been a commonplace, without any consideration of religion. Hindus have fought with Hindus and Muslims with Muslims and have indulged in cross-alliances when necessary. Aurangzeb did not stop cooperating politically with Hindu princes and Shivaji did not mind having a Muslim ally when the sultan of Golconda supported his campaign in Southern India. After the plunder of Surat by Shivaji in 1664, Aurangzeb deputed one of his ablest generals, Mirza Raja Jai Singh Kachhwaha of Amber, to destroy Shivaji and thereafter to invade and annex the Muslim sultanate of Bijapur. Jai Singh soon secured Shivaji’s capitulation and forced him to sign a treaty in June 1665, ceding four-fifths of his territory and promising to serve the emperor loyally. Shivaji then accompanied Jai Singh with his 11,000 troops to the abortive Mughal campaign to Bijapur. It seemed for the moment that Shivaji's career had come to an end, for he agreed to present himself at Aurangzeb's court at Agra with the promise of a Mughal mansab in return. He did so, taking with him offerings of gifts of submission, but he was not happy at his treatment. First, at the imperial court he was asked to stand with other mansabdars, in order of precedence, behind Jaswant Singh, whom he had previously defeated. Second, the Mughals considered 5,000 to be a very high rank for a new entrant like Shivaji, but he expected a mansab of at least 7,000 because of his political standing and prestige in the Deccan. Sensing Shivaji’s reluctance to compromise, he was put under house arrest. Palace intrigue prevented Aurangzeb from resolving the misunderstandings. Before the Emperor could take further action, Shivaji escaped wearing a deception to the Deccan on 28 August 1666.

In 1674 Shivaji, however, was able to establish his small kingdom like others in the Deccan. For this purpose, the most revered Hindu theologian at Varanasi, Gagga Bhatta was persuaded to declare that Shivaji was not a šudra, but a lapsed Kshatriya, a Rajput. Gagga Bhatta traveled to the Maratha capital where he purified Shivaji and invested him with the sacred thread and Vedic verses reserved for the twice born castes. At the royal consecration on June 6, 1674, Gagga Bhatta raised the royal umbrella over Shivaji's head and hailed him as a Siva Chhatrapati (Lord of the Four Quarters).

Osman Sher

On Thursday, October 20, 2022 at 01:56:41 p.m. EDT, Pramod Ranjan <in...@janvikalp.org> wrote: