A visit to Gaylords
by Jay Subramanyam

Have been travelling a lot, of late. I was in Mumbai last fortnight
and it so happened that I was staying at Churchgate with my uncle, just a few minutes of walk from Gaylord, which incidentally had just celebrated its 50th anniversary. Remember, it opened in December 1956.

Even as I sauntered in, I was in for a huge disappointment as the one person I was eagerly looked forward to meeting had I was told, passed away just recently. I had heard so much about Shakeel Khan ji, who had joined as a waiter hand and had risen to become chief steward at Gaylord. He was so very closely associated with the restaurant and apart from being Jaikishan ji's closest confidante, he was a treasure-trove of Urdu couplets and shairi. I believe some of the famous lyricists of Bollywood would pay him a visit to spruce up their writing skills and get some inspirational tit-bits.

Among the handful of people of those times who are still serving the restaurant, happens to be one Radha Kishan Bhatt, who joined the restaurant in 1968 and continues to work in the kitchen. When I mentioned the name of Jaikishan I could immediately discern a smile on his face. I egged him a little and he was willing to share some memories even if his talk was in monologues. He recollected Jaikishan as pleasantly good-looking with a smile that really carried. He visited Gaylord almost everyday whenever he was in Mumbai, twice on an average [which continued even as much as a month before his demise, when his illness suddenly took a turn for the worse]. Jaikishan ji's morning visits were around 11, when a local band used to perform, and he used to listen in rapt attention with the feet tapping ebulliently to the swaying rhythms. [After Shakeel ji's death the band too was dismantled]. Around 7 in the evening, he used to pay a second visit usually accompanied by friends, which gradually became a veritable hive of activity & untrammeled repartee. More than anything else, it was his immanent large-heartedness that endeared everyone to Jaikishan ji, as he never kept a hold on the purse-strings and for every one of the waiters, his presence guaranteed earnings, hand over fist. Who has said `the skillful cup-bearer is always careful to leave the imbiber with a little thirst'?

Gaylord has changed décor considerably since those days and the much-talked about dance floor is now defunct with a protruding arch-like pillar occupying its centre portion, connecting it with the first floor. Jaikishan ji used to occupy the famous table no. 23, adjacent to the dance floor [The table has now shifted to the first floor]. Irrespective of his presence, the table had the `Reserved for Mr. Jaikishan' tag for most of the day, except when he was out of town for prolonged spells. And then of course, were the plenitude of female fans, who swarmed on him like locusts and on occasion, deliberately occupied his chair in the extreme right corner, refusing to leave in spite of repeated admonitions and unending palliatives, which often led to a lot of discomfiture for the staff.


The one other person I spoke to was Shri A.N. Malhotra who is now the Chairman of the Restaurant - a rather disarming and unassumingly modest person. He was quite effusive in Jaikishan's praise and said that `he was and still counts as among our most valuable customers and it was entirely because of him that the restaurant became a focal point for select Bollywood celebrities and aspiring starlets, which sadly is no longer the case as everybody has moved on to smarter and more posh & up-market joints. In spite of being a celebrity composer and among the most famous names in Bollywood, he had absolutely no airs or graces and mingled with the crowd just like a common man. He never once snubbed or humiliated his fans but was always receptive towards them, though he positively disliked aspiring singers approaching him for a hear-in at the restaurant'. [Jaikishan ji did condescend to use a new voice - that of Suresh Rajvanshi for `Aan Baan', a couple of months before his demise. I doubt, though, if the song ever made it to the final print.] Digressing a little, Malhotra ji said in a lighter vein that the dance sessions had to be discontinued as they were eating into the revenues. Unlike the band, the floor dance used to continue unabated, which meant that people would come and sit in leisure till the fun lasted and as a result the customer turnover was plummeting.

The course of my conversations revealed something quite startling, that after his first spell of illness, Jaikishan ji had to be operated upon and he was very much on the road to recovery, when just three days before his demise, he had a fatal relapse for reasons that are difficult for me to describe here for they really sent a chill down the spine. Besides, I cannot confirm the authenticity of these claims, so they are best kept closeted without raising any vestigial anxieties about Jaikishan ji's untimely demise. But I got the feeling that had there been a little more circumspection on the part of the concerned, Jaikishan ji would still perhaps, have been amongst us.

The one last bit that the staff remembered was when Jaikishan ji's cortege moved from Gobind Mahal [a distance of some two kilometers from Gaylord], it paused for about 10 minutes outside the restaurant where the entire staff assembled to pay its respects even as a spirit of sullen discontent was prevalent all-around. The frenzied throngs of people who had caused a virtual stampede at Marine Drive gradually began to thin out as the retinue moved along and took a detour to Queen's Crematorium.

Another person I happened to come across was Kamal Roy ji, the husband of Late, Nirupa Roy ji who too has been a regular at the restaurant since the early 60s and has a table reserved for him as well. Apparently, he was busy with a book on Nirupa ji in Gujarati and wasn't all that forthcoming with any interesting anecdotes on Jaikishan ji. Throughout the discussions, he never seemed to flinch or change his stern immobility and our talks were confined to Nirupa ji's illustrious career, but that is something for another day and another time. I spent close to an hour with him as he gave me a dissertation of life in his times in Mumbai and the way the city has evolved over the years. After a while, I was reminded of Alciabades fleeing the company of Socrates, lest he spent his whole life just listening to his master's wisdom. I realized it was time to move on.

As I passed Gobind Mahal and stole a prosaic glance at the lashing waves on the parapet walls across the sea-front, I recollected how the S-J wave was gathering momentum just when I was leaving the harbourage of boyhood and peaked just when I was all set to sail the turbulent sea of life. Now, I was stung by a startling metaphor that it was perhaps, the Almighty's decree that Jaikishan ji be relieved at the top of the high tide and not be left forlorn by a receding wave, like so many of his illustrious colleagues including Shanker ji. Even as the pain of their loss is dredged up along with the past, we continue to draw sustenance from the wellsprings of S-J's timeless ditties.