Geeta Dutt (1930-72)

Aka Geeta Roy. Singer born in Faridpur (now Bangladesh). Trained under composer Hanuman Prasad who launched her in Bhakta Prahlad (1946). First major hit in Filmistan production Do Bhai (1947) where, to S.D. Burman’s music, she sang Mera sundar sapna. Although an orthodox rendition compared with her later work, it pioneered a move away from the ghazal-inflected folk style inherited from the studio era represented by e.g. Amirbai Karnataki or by Shamshad Begum’s Pancholi songs. She had hits in Jogan (1950), composed by Bulo C. Rani (e.g. Ghunghat ke pat khole re) and Anarkali (1953), but is best remembered for her Guru Dutt films (she was married to the director) like Baazi (1951: she introduced a crooning style with her hit Tadbir se bigdi here), Mr and Mrs ’55 (1955), Pyaasa (1957), Kaagaz Ke Phool (1959) and Sahib Bibi Aur Ghulam (1962). The songs of these films remain among the biggest successes in post-Independence Hindi cinema.