पंछी बनूँ, उड़ती फिरूँ मस्त गगन में

The imminent disinvestment of Air India made headlines this week, outlining the agenda of the ruling disposition. The organisation has served the country well and was poised to reach greater heights, notwithstanding the legacy issues, of which it is plagued with. While it may be a sound business decision, the folding up of Maharaja, the national carrier seems to be a loss of sorts, even to people like me who rarely travel by air. 

While Hindi films songs have been shot on most  modes of transport,  songs shot while the characters are  in air is a relatively rare category . Still, some searching revealed that a large  number of songs fit the theme.

 So, here's a light-hearted  take on the phenomenon of Songs sung in Air.

The earliest song I could get hold of,  is from a comedy film Bewaqoof ( 1960). Kishore Kumar is at his hilarious best in the film !
Kishore tries to speak Italian and hops on a car with Mala Sinha and later a sequence  shows singing in a helicopter. Shot as a dream sequence condones a lot of stuff. The shots of helicopter are taken separately and the actors singing the song are separate cuts. Still, a lot of imaginative ideas must have been  going on in the director's mind to have conceived the song.
The first instance of Italian Job in Hindi films !

The next song is again featuring Kishore, this time on a flying car with Kumkum. The film is Mr.X in Bombay, an "invisible man" story,  This is  no time to think about the engineering aspects or logic: just listen to the melody ( Incidentally, the tune was lifted for the Baazigar song 'Ae mere hamsafar' ).  The narrative mentions a scientist having a potion for making people invisible and probably the car must also have been running on anti-gravity fuel !

The helicopter makes a comeback in 1967, with Shammi Kapoor hanging precariously and serenading a water-surfing Sharmila in An Evening in Paris. The song was a rage is the most well-known of the songs featuring  air-borne protagonists, though the picturisation in air is partial.  It beats me how a person can maintain the 'sur ' and 'taal' in the song while hanging from a helicopter going up and down. Well, in Indian films, the hero is a superman , so he can do things perfectly.

The year 1967 also saw the release of a truly international Hindi  film called "Around the World". Raj Kapoor has the onerous task of going around the world in 8 dollars ( the dollar-rupee rate being Rs.7.50 p that year ). The song gives an aerial view of the whole world , so it is recommended to watch this song on a large screen in HD and save your multiple trips to various parts of the world. Rajshree was the heroine and there was a  cameo by Sir Frank Worrell, when Raj touched West Indies, now called WINDIES, officially. The theme of foreign cricketers' tryst with Bollywood is a separate one. Watch this space !

The seventies saw a flurry of songs shot wholly or partly in aeroplanes. 

The first of such songs was from the film Jugnu and had the hero Dharmendra chasing heroine Hema Malini in air. So, the chase and tease sequence is taken at a higher level, pun intended !
 There is an airplane with hero chasing the heroine, who is with villain Prem Chopra in a helicopter. The funny thing is that Hema is able to listen to the song ( through her headphones?) and also responds at time, calling him "Idiot" !
The shots in the plane are at camera level and all shot at one go. The editor's task is more difficult, clipping the right shots and adding them , so as to make the song appear to be one smooth sequence.

                                        

Prem Nagar in 1974 showed a real plane ( or is it a set in studio ? ) with Hema Malini as an indulgent air hostess, with  an inebriated Rajesh Khanna as a passenger,  reciting Faani Badayuni's philosophical poetry ! Interestingly, the passengers, mostly female, are also wanting him to continue. The unruly passengers must have been there on planes ever since the commencement of commercial operations.
However, it is better than beating an official with chappals, I say !  

Amongst the different ways that someone can be in the air ( apart from being in seventh heaven ) is para-gliding. It is the enterprising spirit of Hindi film-makers that this find a place in the anthology. Rishi Kapoor and Shoma Anand sing a song while up in the air : a song whose lyrics are reflective of Stockholm Syndrome ( see my musiblog  on the subject  at  http://amitabhn-randomthinking.blogspot.in/2017/05/blog-post_19.html).

The director had enough of para-gliding by end of  one and a half minutes and the remaining song is completed on Mother Earth.

In the same year we had a fantasy film Bundulbaaz , directed by Shammi Kapoor ( of the hanging-from-the-helicopter fame), having Rajesh Khanna ( of the drunk-poetry recital -in-plane fame) and Sulakshana Pandit. Kapoor plays a genie who has to fulfill the wishes of his Kaka, sorry Aaka ....

It seems that due to the flying carpet being out of stock, Shammi, the Genie uses his palm to give Kaka and Sulakshana a ride in air as they belt out the song Bemausam bahaar ke din kaise aaye, expressing their bewilderment at the choice of the Genie's palm !

Long before the Genies in the bottles, in our pious land there was a deity who used the aerial route across the sea to convey important message  to  a lady separated from her husband due to abduction.  Yes, I am referring to Hanuman.
How can this write up be complete without a flying image of Hanuman !
 In 1976, in the film Bajrangbali ( till that time religious films still used to be made ), we have Hanuman flying off to a mission and a song is dedicated to him.
Bol Siyavar Ramchaandra ki jai , pawan-sut Hanooman ki jai

In 1977, we had Kaka again ( I wonder if this has something to do with me being his Superfan !) , this time with Zeenat Aman professing his love amidst the clouds and in a two-seater. Not satisfied with the two-seater, later on they switch to para-gliding.
 Thus came about the expression "प्यार की नयी ऊंचाइयां छू लीं " 

Cut to 1985 and in the film Saaheb, we have Anil Kapoor and Amrita Singh taking   all modes of transportation in one song.First a boat and then the train and finally aboard an empty  Indian Airlines flight ! Amrita Singh becomes the air hostess,giving the deprived masses a   "feel" of air  journey. The vicarious pleasure that Hindi cinema gives to its viewers is indeed, a yeoman service.

 The 90s had films bordering on flights but with no songs in air. Shahrukh Khan stalked air hostess Madhuri Dixit in Anjaam, but the song  Badi mushkil hai...was shot in the airport premises. In Border, while Jackie Shroff played the Air Force commander, Sunny on the field kept singing the clarion call song. Actually for the song in air either you have to be the crew or the passenger.

The 2006 film Vivah had a song and dance sequence inside a commercial flight, an indication of the options of shooting locations available with producers. Shahid Kapoor also helps the air hostess  Amrita Rao in  serving tea and snacks to the passengers. A few more such songs and this would also become as  commonplace as the running round the  tree location.

The easiest way to be in air is to know how to fly on your own. While the Gods and Genies and Superman had inherent powers to do this, it took  some time to have these powers bestowed on our superhero,The Flying Jatt. Released in 2016 , the film is about an Indian Superhero who likes to sing while flying.
If you know how to fly, sky is the limit !

The same year, a very different film was released in which it is asserted that the Wright brothers were preceded by  our own Hindustani deekra , inventor of the first unmanned aircraft !
He was the real Hawaizada. Played  by Ayushman Khurana, the  uncredited inventor  did sing a song while on his maiden flight.

One of the more sensitive films made on the background of flying was Neerja (2016) , based on the short but great life of air hostess Neerja Bhanot. In one of the poignant moments in the film, Sonam Kapoor remembers her mother during a flight.

 Leaving you with the beautiful song. Ciao