Ameen Sayani: The man who made India fall in love with Radio
Jhumri Telaiya in Jharkhand has a large number of All India Radio followers who send song requests to the radio station. It was here, when I was on an assignment, a few years ago that I came across Ameen Sayani. He was part of the town’s lore.
When one Rameshwarprasad Barnwal, who was of a mining family, sent a postcard to Radio Ceylon, his name got mentioned in Ameen Sayani’s Binaca Geetmala, its legendary programme of Hindi film songs in the ’50s. Thereafter everyone in the town wished to have their humble share of fame.
Sayani passed away, aged 91 on Tuesday night in Mumbai after a heart attack. Born in Mumbai, the youngest of three brothers, his father Dr Janmohommed, a doctor, and mother Kulsum Sayani, was an editor of the magazine Rahber.
Veteran Mumbai-based radio anchor Manohar Mahajan who was associated with Radio Ceylon for many years, says Sayani had all the qualities that were essential for a radio professional.
Ameen Sayani began his stint with Radio Ceylon in 1951. “His throw of voice, his way of greeting an unseen audience; he had superb control over language; he had vocabulary and the pronounciation to go with it, he brought together all these and used it to great impact,” he says.
Popular producer-anchor of Guftagoo, Irfan, who has been hosting live radio shows on FM for more than a decade interviewed Sayani for Doorsdarshan in 2005.
What he remembers of him is Sayani being quite particular about the way he was being presented; he had an image and in some manner wanted to “control” it.
“Where was he to sit, where was the interviewer to be seated, he wanted in a manner of speaking to control the set,” says Irfan.
That said, there is no denying Sayani’s unique signature style, his language a mix of Hindi and Urdu, his constant attempt to connect with the audience in a popular idiom at a time when national broadcasters were Hindi or Urdu-centric.
Irfan who belongs to a different school of anchoring, but has studied Sayani’s script, offers an example to show what distinguished Sayani’s style from others: “Arrey bahno-bhaiyo...udhar mann ki matwali been baji aur idhar aap mujhse ladney ke liye khadey ho gaye hai? Aap shayad yahi shikayat karna chahte hain ki main aise hit geeton ki jhalkein hi kyon baja raha hun? Poore geet kyon nahin baja raha?”
The easy familiarity of address; the reversal of the conventional “bhaiyo-bahno” to “bahno-bhaiyo” guaranteed to endear him to female listeners; the ability to talk to a radio audience as if a conversation was taking place in real time; and persuasion as a style and mode of address -- all this made him a standout artist and legend that anchors looking for instant popularity, rushed to imitate without much success.
Sayani was a prolific artiste.
As recorded in recorded in the Limca Book of Records, between All India Radio (since 1951), AIR's Commercial Service (since 1970) and various foreign stations (since 1976), Sayani produced, compered (or spoken for) over 54,000 radio programmes and 19,000 spots/jingles.
As the famous Rafi song goes -- Tum mujhe yun bhula na paoge, Haan tum mujhe yun bhula na paoge -- the world will not forget the Padma Shri awardee easily.