On the occasion of Bollywood legend Mohammed Rafi’s 101st birth anniversary, actor Jackie Shroff paid tribute to the iconic singer.
Jackie shared a monochrome image of Rafi on his X account (formerly Twitter) and included the timeless track “Aise To Na Dekho” from the 1965 film Teen Devian, picturised on Dev Anand and Nanda. He captioned the post: “Remembering Mohd. Rafi ji on his birth anniversary #MohdRafi.”
Rafi’s musical journey encompassed a wide spectrum of genres, ranging from fast, peppy numbers to patriotic anthems and deeply romantic songs. His versatility extended to qawwalis, ghazals, bhajans, and classical pieces. What set him apart was his remarkable ability to adapt his voice to suit the persona of the actor lip-syncing on screen.
Throughout his illustrious career, Rafi recorded songs for over a thousand Hindi films and in numerous Indian languages, in addition to several foreign languages, predominantly Urdu and Punjabi. He is credited with an astonishing 7,000 songs in languages including Konkani, Assamese, Bhojpuri, Odia, Bengali, Marathi, Sindhi, Kannada, Gujarati, Tamil, Telugu, Magahi, and Maithili. He also sang in languages such as English, Persian, Arabic, Sinhala, Mauritian Creole, and Dutch.
Some of his unforgettable tracks include “Chaudhvin Ka Chand Ho,” “Baharon Phool Barsao,” “Likhe Jo Khat Tujhe,” “Teri Aankhon Ke Siva,” “Yeh Reshmi Zulfein,” “Pukarta Chala Hoon Main,” “Kya Hua Tera Wada,” “Aaj Mausam Bada Beimaan Hai,” “Khoya Khoya Chand,” and “Gulabi Aankhen.”
Rafi passed away in 1980 at the age of 55 due to a massive heart attack, and his last recorded song was for the movie Aas Paas, with music by Laxmikant-Pyarelal.
In other news, Jackie Shroff will soon appear in Ahmed Khan’s upcoming comedy film titled Welcome To The Jungle, which boasts an impressive ensemble cast featuring Akshay Kumar, Sanjay Dutt, Suniel Shetty, Arshad Warsi, Paresh Rawal, Raveena Tandon, Disha Patani, Lara Dutta, Jacqueline Fernandez, Shreyas Talpade, Aftab Shivdasani, Mika Singh, Mukesh Tiwari, Zakir Hussain, Yashpal Sharma, Johnny Lever, Rajpal Yadav, Krushna Abhishek, Kiku Sharda, Daler Mehndi, Tusshar Kapoor, and Sayaji Shinde.