Dev Anand: The Original ‘Jawan’

The celebration in the air is palpable. His old superhits are being screened in theatres for the last few days. There have been panel discussions on the TV and the internet, news articles, music shows—all about that one man who turns 25 four times over today. In Indian films, epithets like ‘superstar’, ‘tragic hero’, ‘romantic hero’, ‘angry young man’ have been attached to different actors across ages. But ‘evergreen’ belongs only to one—the legendary Dev Anand.

Dev Anand. Illustrated by Dishani Goswami, Visual Storyteller at ThisDay

The 1950s were a time when the euphoria of newfound freedom quickly gave way to the reality of scarce employment opportunities in Bombay for the youth that migrated to the big city with the hope of getting decent jobs. And Dev Anand’s roles of Madan in Baazi (1951), Ashok in House No. 44 (1955), and Raghu in Kala Bazar (1961) were representative of this cramping as each character is forced to fall back on illegal ways to earn a livelihood. Raghu in Kala Bazar strolls the streets by night crooning ‘Teri dhoom har kahin’, sarcastically extolling the supremacy of money. The pavement dwellers sleeping at night under the ever-present street bulb reflected the reality of the city’s lower depths. Their aesthetic expression of life’s obstacles formed an instant connection with the struggling youngsters watching these movies. They ‘saw’ themselves in Dev Anand. Among Dev Anand’s peers, Raj Kapoor’s characters were the tragic tramps that appeared to demand sympathy, and Dilip Kumar played the thoughtful, reticent romantic. But Dev Anand’s characters like Mangal in Taxi Driver (1954) surfed the crest of the waves singing ‘Mastram banke zindagi din ke din guzaar de’ (live life the way you please). This breezy disposition handed out hope. And that is what a young India learning to walk on its own needed. In an evidently Hollywood noir-inspired attire and demeanour, Dev Anand looked tailor-made for the knee-length trench coats, sporty berets, open-necked shirts, outlandish scarves, a two-day old stubble, and a cigarette, looking at home in a bar with a pretty girl singing. And, most importantly, the haughty swagger that carried the delicate aroma of forbidden scents.

Tony Fernandez’s story in Jaal (1952) is that of a strong, smart young man. But instead of working hard and earning honest money like hundreds of other fishermen in Goa, he chooses to work for the smugglers. Tony was born defective with a propensity for the wrong, fast, and easy — nothing systemic about it. But Tony knows that he wants to turn a new leaf. ‘Jo aaj bura hai woh kal accha ho sakta hai’ (A bad man can turn into a good one), he tells his lady love Maria. He bows in supplication to the almighty and reforms. A young India needed this faith. As Shyam Benegal said in an interview with this author, ‘If you study those films, they seem to have qualities of anti-heroes, but they are not so. Eventually they are still shining good men.’

It is not that all of Dev Anand’s roles of the 1950s portrayed dark anti-heroes. He played the good man in successful outings like Sazaa (1951), Patita (1953), Munimji (1955), Funtoosh (1956), Paying Guest (1957), Nau Do Gyarah (1957), Solva Saal (1958), Love Marriage (1959), and Kala Pani (1958). This gave him the vestibule into the conventional romantic 1960s even as he approached forty and crossed it without ageing a day. Unlike other heroes of his time, Dev Anand’s characters were comfortable romancing women without perceivable qualms. In Teen Devian (1966), Dev romanced three women without cheating on any of them. It was just young Devdutt Anand exercising his right of choice as he chivalrously distributed S.D. Burman’s melodies among the three women. Yes, the screen name sounded curiously close to the actor’s real name. Was it meant to mirror Dev Anand’s credo of what his characters should be like? (Dev Anand, by his own admission, had ghost-directed Teen Devian). In Jewel Thief (1967), the count of women went up to five, including a right-up-to-the-edge flirting with Anjali (Tanuja) and a one-night stand with Helen (Helen), albeit for business reasons. What made Vinay (Dev Anand) different was that while it was love at (almost) first sight with Shalini (Vyjyanthimala), he enjoyed the company of the other women too.

Contrast this character with that of Kumar (Biswajeet) in the superhit Mere Sanam (1965). Kamini (Mumtaz) tries to seduce him in the Asha Bhosle solo ‘Yeh hai reshmi zulfon ka andhera’. Kumar wears a scandalised expression on his face throughout the number and pushes her away rudely, as if demonstrating his fidelity towards his lady love to the whole world. It looked artificial and pretentious. Dev Anand’s characters, on the other hand, believed that a young man, in his journey to his ‘Ms. Right’, should not shy away from beautiful company. There was no hypocrisy about him.

Dev Anand met an Indian girl named Janice in the Bakery, an (in)famous hippie den in Kathmandu. The girl had travelled the hippie trail all the way from Montreal in search of peace in the mystic East, seeking solace in marijuana, hashish, LSD, and the companionship of like-minded parvenus. It was the story for a potentially great film. And thus dawned the 1970s with Dev Anand’s Hare Rama Hare Krishna (1971). He gave India its first pin-up icon—Femina Miss India and Miss Asia Pacific International, Zeenat Aman. At twenty, Zeenat would become a star, courtesy the role of the drug addicted Jasbir/Janice and the music album that included ‘Dum maro dum’ and ‘I love you’.

In his transition from the late 40s till his mid-50s, Dev Anand found a more-than-useful ally in R.D. Burman (Pancham) of whom Sunil Dutt once said, “He (Pancham) understood youth like no other music director did.” Pancham’s youthful melodies, his innovations and contrarian orchestrations, matched with Kishore Kumar’s zestful voice, created magical albums for Dev Anand—Hare Rama Hare Krishna, Heera Panna (1973), Joshila (1973), Ishk Ishk Ishk (1974), Warrant (1975), Bullet (1976), and Darling Darling (1977). Pancham and Kishore Kumar (and, of course, Anand Bakshi’s lyrics) were the soul of Dev Anand’s characters— it did not look like he was going to stop playing the romantic male lead anytime soon. A profession like a glamour photographer on the lookout for a bikini model in Heera Panna (1973) fit him as snugly as the bikini did Zeenat. Lyrics like ‘Daudi chali aati hain, mai jisko pukarta hoon’ (the women are at my beck and call) ensured that Dev lost none of his swagger even at 50.

Dev Anand kept himself slim and fit throughout. He almost always answered phone calls himself. Even after Hare Rama Hare Krishna, he introduced youngsters, the most prominent among them being Tina Ambani née Munim in Des Pardes (1978). He thought young, playing the role of the man ‘urbanising’ the girl in three films—Man Pasand (1979), Darling Darling, and Des Pardes.

His slanting gait, his urbane disposition, the smile with his head cocked, the occasional pursing of his mouth accompanied with a couple of quick nods, and the express-speed dialogue delivery lent him an inimitable style that many loved to imitate. After a particular point it didn’t matter whether his films clicked or not (which they didn’t, after Des Pardes). But people took pride in their association with him and enjoyed his infectious passion for filmmaking and acting. Said Prem Chopra, “Once anybody worked with him for 10-15 days, I bet everybody will talk like him, walk like him, behave like him.” When this author met Dev Anand at Anand Cine Studio in 2009, he spoke excitedly about his upcoming film Chargesheet with an enthusiasm at 86 that many half his age would struggle to match.

Dev Anand was, undoubtedly, the first ‘jawan’ of Bollywood—the ‘Evergreen’.

(Balaji Vittal is a National Award-winning and MAMI Award-winning author of Bollywood books, a columnist, a Bollywood commentator, and a public speaker. He can be reached on Twitter at @vittalbalaji and his website is www.balajivittal.com.)