Shankar jaikishan and Satyam Shivam Sundram

by Sh Chandra Shekhar

I am not sure how far the thought of Madan Mohan for Sathyam Shivam Sundaram had crossed in the mind of Raj Kapoor. Many of you might know that this movie was conceived long before it was actually made. The film was inspired from a story told by Lata to Raj. At some point RK even had thought of making the film with Lata as the actress to portray the main role, believe it or not, but that was long before it was made. I am sure RK was well aware of quality music that came out of this combination of Lata and MM..



Now I want to make a general comment regarding what possibly ruled with RK regarding selection of music directors post MNJ.

Jaisinh pictures, they were the distributors for RK films from Barsat to MNJ. It was almost like RK's own distribution company--only it was not. This was a loose association, because all RK films completed during this period were never sold to the distributor. If the film was a success, the margin of profit was huge for RK films, in the same token, if it failed it incurred a huge loss.

After the failure of MNJ, there was a radical change with RK films. The association with Jaisinh pictures was gone. For the first time, the next film, Bobby, was sold to distributors. For example, Bobby was sold to Delhi and UP circuit for a sum of 45 lakhs to a distributing company part owner, of which was, in fact, Shashi Kapoor. It was sold to different areas at different prices. This being the customary practice of most producers to sell in this fashion. This was so much of a change for RK, but he realized the safety involved here. Very much so, after the commercial loss of MNJ. He could just not survive one more loss, it would probably have been the end of his filmmaking.

However, this change had a major STRING attached, distributors had a price tag on several factors like the stars and music directors in the film. In essence, they had a formula, the so-called "formula films". They bought the films based on this formula. Film with superstars with top billing got the highest amount of money and also current top MD's got the highest amount. Consequently, the majority of producers were at the mercy of the distributors who could easily dictate terms, because they were buying the films and, in doing so, were inheriting the risks that came with them. The producer was relieved of the risks as a result.

Post MNJ, RK was, to a large extent, dictated by these financiers and film distributors. He had understood the safety involved financially at that point. So his decision was strongly influenced from this point-of-view.

Going a little further back, there has been several comments about what a staggering amount SJ charged from Arzoo onwards. I have some comments on this:

The Hindi film industry went through a major transformation in the mid 60's and onwards. People involved, realized that they could make mega bucks with a successful film. Just to illustrate, with no intent to hurt anyone's feelings, a film like Leader with top star Dilip Kumar and Dil Diya Dard Liya both with music by Naushad made average money; whereas, several Rajendra Kumar films or other stars in films which had music by SJ brought in lot of money. The difference was huge in selling a film with SJ music to a non-SJ music. Producers were making so much money it was easy for SJ to realize this and ask for 5 lakhs, which truly was probably not much. The byproduct of this was it also weaned off quality, but non-selling MD's such as Naushad, Madan Mohan etc. from the mainstream
Then again this system that evolved out of SJ music had a backlash, the victim being S. Once J passed away, no matter how good S was, he lost the top billing. Here, in this context, even a small drop is a major or humongous drop. I would like to think that this translated to so many other top producers in switching from S to other MDs.

I think It was, as they say, purely a MATTER OF BUSINESS.

Welcome any criticism or comments. Apologize if needs correction, I have gathered this information at different times and different sources. Just tried to understand the mechanics of commercial aspects. Have tried to express in the interest of the forum, so it is subject to correction. What I think is authentic, most of which could be verified.