Atif Aslam’s rendition of the iconic melody, Chalte Chalte, for Bollywood film Mitron, has received quite a bit of flake as it takes the delicate notes of the original tune and wrenches them out of context.
Legendary singer, Lata Mangeshkar, who sang the original for the film Pakeezah says that she hasn’t heard Atif’s version and will not be doing so either.
“I don’t want to hear it. This trend of remixing old songs saddens me. Where is the creativity in simply lifting acknowledged, beloved classics and shuffling the notes around? I’ve even heard that the lyrics are changed in the remixes. By whose consent?” Lata said.
While She continued, “The original poets and composers wrote what they had to. Nobody has the right to tamper with the creativity of these great composers and lyricists.”
The composition of the song is credited to Tanishk Bagchi.
Speaking of the song, singer and BJP MP Babul Supriyo, no fan of Atif’s singing, said. “Today, even the poetic term ‘artistic liberty’ is at the verge of extinction. With due respect (and disrespect) to Atif Aslam, as a singer myself, I will observe a 2-minute silence to mourn rather than offering a comment.”
Mangeshkar’s Chalte chalte yuhi koi mil gaya tha, a mellow mujra melody was composed by the great Ghulam Mohammed for the mythic Meena Kumari swan song in Pakeezah.
Singer Alka Yagnik, whose song Dilbar Dilbar was recently remixed, on the song, remarked, “Why don’t they make a new song and make it a super hit if they can, instead of picking up an already super hit song, distorting it, and releasing it again… and then saying, ‘See, it’s become so popular’!”
She added that they even ruin her songs but she’s okay with that. However, she said that “their audacity is increasing by the day and now they’ve started doing this to Lata’s song as well.”
Also, Pahlaj Nihalani, the former Chairperson of the censor board, wonders why Bollywood is looking towards Pakistan for music.
“Every day there is an incident. Our soldiers are being killed. We can’t say artists are immune to politics. At the end of the day, they are citizens of their country first, artistes later.”