Standing before the modest marble tomb of the Mallika-e-Ghazal, the immortal Begum Akhtar, nestled in a narrow galli flanked by countless lower-middle-class apartment blocks in Pasand Bagh of old Lucknow on a cold February morning, this I was reminded of my visit, some time ago, to a rickety bylane in Madurai—the birthplace of another divine nightingale, MS.Subbulakshmi.

According to the caretaker at the Begum’s mazaar built beside her mother's within a small brick enclosure, it was restored only a decade ago by her admirers complete with its Italian Pietra dura inlay design, from an even more obscure state. The area, now chock-a-block with shanties, was originally a sprawling mango orchard that belonged to the great singer.

Reflecting on these two singing queens, who embodied India's two major classical traditions, I was struck by the remarkable parallels in these remarkable women’s lives and careers in a patriarchal world. Born just two years apart—1914 and 1916—the Carnatic singer was only slightly younger. Though their families followed different faiths, both were born in ancient towns steeped in Hindu traditions, located in the north and south regions of the country: Begum near Ayodhya and MS in Madurai. In their gifted voices, pain and prayer, love and longing resonated with equal intensity. However, Akthar’s music was soaked in pain most, perhaps her share of personal agonies were unparalleled.

Their parentage, too, reveals striking parallels. Both were raised in single-parent households by artistic mothers who shared similar social backgrounds as professional entertainers to the elite—women who, in later times, bore the weight of social stigma. If Bibbi’s (young Akhtar’s) mother, Mushtari, was a tawaif (courtesan), Kunjamma’s (Subbulakshmi’s) veena-playing mother, Shanmughavadivu, was a Devadasi.

Both singers’ fathers came from more privileged backgrounds but were largely absent from their lives. Akhtar’s father, Asghar Hussain, a lawyer from an aristocratic family of Lucknow, disowned her mother—his second wife—and their twin daughters. Subbulakshmi’s father, Subramania Iyer, a Brahmin lawyer, remained a distant figure. (However, several of MS’s biographers, including T.J.S. George, suggests that her real father was the renowned Carnatic musician Madurai Pushpavanam Iyer.).

Akthar's tormented childhood experiences were extremely traumatic which scarred her forever. Her twin sister Zohra died in childhood by accidentally consuming poison. According to Begum Akhtar's biography by her disciple Rita Ganguly, the singer suffered abusive music teachers during her childhood. Akthar had the most excruciating experience at 13 when she was raped by a raja while she went to perform in his palace. Ganguly says the singer even bore a child from this tragedy whom her mother Mushtari brought up as........

© Mathrubhumi English