BHOPAL: The house in Indore’s Sikh Mohalla locality, where legendary singer, Bharat Ratna Lata Mangeshkar was born on September 28, 1929 is now history, as it has been replaced by the Mehta Cloth Center, which now remembers Lata Didi with a mural within the shop.
But around 22 km away in the same city, the Pigdambar village houses the Lata Dinanath Mangeshkar Gramophone Records Sangrahalaya -- a rare museum of gramophone records preserving the rarest of rare collections of songs sung by Lata Didi between 1955 and 2006.
The museum located close to the Indian Institute of Management (IIM-Indore) campus isn’t a government creation, but instead being run since 1970 by 70-year-old Suman Chourasia, a die-hard Lata Mangeshkar fan, who is loved by the Mangeshkar family as Lata Didi’s second brother, after Hridaynath Mangeshkar.
The museum of gramophone records located in the house of the Chourasia family (which migrated to Indore from East UP’s Jaunpur district over 150 years ago) is a treasure house of 45,000-plus rarest of rare gramophone records of Indian films, folk and classical music, including 7500-plus records of Lata Didi’s songs.
“This museum dedicated to Lata Didi was started in 1970 and preserves 7500-plus gramophone records of her songs sung in 32 languages, spanning from the 1955 film Uran Khatola to 2006 film Rang De Basanti. Even Lata Didi’s family has sourced from us the rarest of rare records, which even they didn’t possess,” recounted Suman Chourasia, who has been regarded as a family member by the Mangeshkar family over the last four decades.
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“It is Lata Didi’s nephew Baijnath who has been sourcing from me, her rarest of rare songs since last two decades,” said Chourasia, whose love for preserving the gramophone records at the museum, despite financial crunch, forced him to sell his agricultural and residential plots as well as wife Neelima’s jewellery to source the rarest records, not only from India, but also abroad.
“Respecting my love for Lata Didi’s songs and other gramophone records, my wife has stood by me even in most trying situations and never allowed the Lata Dinanath Mangeshkar Gramophone Records Museum to halt its operations,” Chourasia added proudly.
Chourasia, who has had several memorable meetings with the singing legend between early 1980s and 2018, said “I’m fortunate that Lata Didi loved me as her second brother, but unfortunate that I wasn’t there in Mumbai, when she breathed last. I’m right now in Jhansi (UP), but making all arrangements to be with the Mangeshkar family in Mumbai by Monday.”
According to Sanjay Mandloi, the vice president of this rare museum of gramophone records, “no matter how big the financial problems have been with him, Suman Chourasia and his family, comprising wife, two daughters and a son, have never allowed the museum to stop functioning.
Presently, Suman Chourasia has an enviable network of gramophone record lovers and owners from across the globe. He has been an extended member of the Mangeshkar family and was in touch with Lata Didi’s personal assistant Mahesh Rathod regularly over phone to keep track of her health.”
“He (Chourasia) has also digitally preserved the rich treasure of melodies of the gramophone records and annually came out with books dedicated to Lata Didi, including a book on her 80 songs with 80 music composers on her 80th birthday in 2009. Lata Didi often told him (Chourasia) not to waste money on publishing the books as she believed that there were hardly any avid readers left, but like any other stubborn younger brother, he overlooked Didi’s advice and continued publishing those books annually,” Mandloi said.