Some posts acquire a life of their own. One such is my earlier one on the song Gagan Jhanjhana Raha from the film Nastik (1954). I had if you recall written that the tune was lifted in full and used for the song Aram Kattha Deviye in Maheswari (1955). With reference to that, Ramineni Bhaskarendra of Madanapalle, my encyclopaedia as far as matters Telugu are concerned, wrote to me that Nastik was dubbed in Tamil as Nastikan and therefore, there must be a Tamil version of Gagan Jhanjhana Raha somewhere.

That set me searching and sure enough, I found it. The film Nasthikan (note added H – you cannot get more Tamil than that) being a dubbed version, did have the song. It goes VeDi viNNil minnuthE and was sung by Trichy Loganathan (he of vArAi nEE vArAi fame) and Lakshmi Shankar (is this the Madras-based exponent of the Patiala gharana who married Rajendra, the brother of Pt Ravi Shankar?).

I however did not like Vedi viNNil minnuthE – Loganathan’s voice is too heavy for such a song and Lakshmi Shankar brings a certain mournful intensity that Lata does not have. The music is by C Ramchandra of course and the Tamil lyrics by Ku Ma Balasubramaniam. I wonder how the Tamil version of Nastik fared. Not many here experienced the horrors of Partition and so the response may have been muted.

Anyway, loads of thanks to Bhaskarendra!

This article is part of a series I write on old film songs, chiefly Hindi and Tamil. You can read the rest here