February 24, 1984
Har Mandir Singh 'Hamraaz', Nalin Shah and Dr Prakash Joshi meet Lata Mangehskar.
From the Listeners' Bulletin issue of May 1984.
He writes:
Around 10:13 [AM], all three of us entered Lata's flat without any problem and seconds later we were graced with the presence of the Koyal-voiced world famous singer Lata. She said, please come, I have been waiting for you. Explaining my tardiness, I said, Lata ji, I had gone to invite Rajindar Krishan, but he became busy with looking at Volume 2, and he was reluctant to stop. Because I wanted to show you this volume also, I had to wait for him to finish, so we are late. [Note: In this Bombay visit, 'Hamraaz' went around inviting celebrities to the Volume 2 public release function that took place on February 25, 1984, at Jai Hind College, Churchgate, compered by Manohar Mahajan.] Then I showed Lata ji Volumes 2 and 3. (Actually about 4-5 days ago, Jhaveri Bhai, secretary to Asha Bhosle, had already shown Lata ji Volume 3, which they had discussed for half an hour.) After casually looking at the book, Lata ji surprised me with a question, So, Har Mandir ji, please tell me, how many songs have I sung? I had not expected this question, least of all from Lata ji, nor was this question in my list of items to discuss with her. After due respect and after apologizing again and again, I humbly said, Lata ji, I could be wrong, but having compiled the Geet Kosh, I surmise that the total number of all songs (all languages, film/non-film) would be between 10,000 and 15,000. Perhaps she was disappointed by my reply because her name had already been mentioned in the Guinness Book of World Records, as the singer with the maximum number of songs (approximately 35,000).
Note: After 35 years of hard work, Snehasis Chatterjee estimates the number to be about 7,500. Photo from his Facebook page.
Now You Know!
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