Legendary
bhajan singer Juthika Roy, who enthralled the likes of Mahatma Gandhi and
Jawaharlal Nehru with her enchanting voice, died at a city hospital following
multiple ailments, a family member said Thursday.
She was 93.
She was admitted to the
hospital January 8. “My aunt was released January 24. But she had to be
re-admitted on February 2 after she had a cerebral attack and put on ventilator
support at the Intensive Therapy Unit,” said Roy.
Born
April 20, 1920 at Amta in then undivided Bengal’s Howrah district, Roy
recorded her first album in 1932 when she was only 12 years old. Roy’s talent
was soon noticed by poet Kazi Nazrul Islam and composer Kamal Das Gupta, both
of whom mentored her. In the 1940s and 1950s, she was among the country’s
leading singers, enjoying soaring popularity, and was affectionately called
Adhunik Meera.
Roy,
who immortalized bhajans like Ghunghat ka pat khol and Pag ghungharu bandh
Meera nachi was conferred the Padma Shri in 1972. On August 15, 1947, she was
requested by none other than Nehru to continue singing on the radio as he
unfurled the tricolour on India’s first Independence Day. “The prime minister
had sent in a request that I was to keep singing till he reached Red Fort and
hoisted the tricolour. I went back to the AIR station… sang some seven-eight
songs,” the legendary singer recalled in an interview.
Even
Gandhi was a great admirer of Roy, and often started his prayer meetings
playing her records. “Mahatma Gandhi used to listen to my songs everyday when
he was jailed in Pune. He used to start his prayer meeting every morning
playing discs that played my bhajans,” Roy said in an article.
Roy
lent her melodious voice in two Bengali films Dhuli and Ratnadeep. Her mortal
remains were consigned to flames at the Ratanbabur Ghat in Baranagar.
