Tun Tun
This is a collection of articles archived for the excellence of their content. |
A brief biography
April 5, 2023: The Times of India
Uma Devi Khatri aka Tun Tun, Hindi cinema’s first woman comedian
➤Over half a century before the onset of wokeism and other isms, when glass ceilings weren’t given to willful breaking, Uma Devi — a Bollywood playback singer-cum-mother of four — made her debut onscreen as a female comic sidekick named Tun Tun
➤She went on to hold her own amid variously-shaped male comedians whose punchlines mined her frame and complexion for laughs. “My bulk is my trump card,” she said once
➤Born in UP on July 11, 1923 and soon orphaned, Uma Devi was raised by a conservative uncle who wasn’t in favour of educating her. She taught herself to read and write Hindi even as she listened to film songs on the radio and sang along
➤Eager to listen to her own voice over the radio at age 13, she would escape to Bombay and knock on the doors of various music directors. Legend has it that she had threatened to fling herself inthe ocean if composer Naushad Ali refused to give her a listen. She landed her first gig as a playback singer for the 1947 film ‘Wamag Azra’ when a visibly impressed Naushad took her under his famous wing
➤Soon, a series of 1940s actresses would lip-sync to her soulful voice in songs composed by Naushad. On delivering instant hits including ‘Afsana likh rahi hoon’ in director Abdul Rashid Kardar’s 1948 film ‘Dard’, Uma Devi entered the revered space occupied then by singers Suraiyya, Rajkumari and Khursheed Bano in her 20s
➤A story goes that ‘Afsana likh rahi hoon’ also ushered love into her life, prompting her future husband-cum-prospective father of her four kids to pack his bags and come away to Bombay to meet her. One account identifies the husband as Akhtar Abbas Kazi, an excise inspector in UP till Partition uprooted him to Lahore
➤Uma Devi’s burgeoning singing career started to fade when incensed by the breach of contract that stemmed from her workingwith another director, filmmaker Kardar terminated their deal. This — combined with the depleting fortunes of the film industry and the formidable new voices of Lata Mangeshkar, Geeta Dutt and Asha Bhonsle — eventually led to her career as a playback singer being nipped in the bud
➤Two years later, in place of lyrics, her voice would emit punchlines. The keenness to support her growing family saw her approach her mentor, Naushad. The composerrenamed her Tun Tun in his film. Soon, industry type-casting and existing social mores ensured that the name became synonymous with a caricaturish figure who embraced crude jokes about dark skin and size made at her expense
➤“I agree dieting is very essential to maintain a slim and healthy body. But where is the need for me to be slim and ravishingly beautiful?” Uma Devi had said once. However, she did exprss regret about the health issues that came from having to maintain her weight to sustain on-screen punchlines
➤Having retired after working in 1982’s ‘Namak Halaal’, the pioneering Hindi film comedian gradually faded out of public memory and passed away in 2003. Along with her, it seems, laughter departed from theatres as, by then, Hindi cinema had outgrown its need for the classical comedian parallel track Curated by Ketaki Desai, with inputs from Amulya Gopalakrishnan and Sharmila Ganesan Ram
