Profile of Geeta Dutt on Famous Like Me

Geeta Dutt (November 23, 1930 - July 20, 1972) was an Indian playback singer of the 1950s.

Geeta Dutt was born into a rich zamindaar's family as Geeta Roy in Faridpur, East Bengal in 1930. In 1942, her parents shifted to a Dadar apartment in Bombay. Composer Hanuman Prasad, overheard her singing and agreed to give her training to sing. He launched her in a chorus song in Brakht Prahlad (1946), but she only sang two lines. Her major assignment was in the following year with Do Bhai. With that, Geeta became a famous playback singer. 1947 - 1949 saw Geeta as the number one playback singer in the Bombay film industry.

Only two playback singers survived Lata's onslaught in the 1950s. They were Shamshad Begum and Geeta Roy. Geeta managed to hold her own agianst Lata, and she and Lata became the premier female playback singers of the 1950s. Initially, Geeta was a singer well known for singing bhajans and weepy, weepy sad songs, but 1951 saw the release of Baazi. The jazzy musical score of the film by S.D. Burman created a new facet in Geeta's singing. From then on in the 1950s for a club dance and a seductive song, the first choice for Geeta. During the recording of a song, she met the young and upcoming director of the film, Guru Dutt. Thus blossomed a romance and they became engaged. They had to overcome alot of family oppostition to marry. They married on 26 May 1953 and had three children: Tarun, Arun, and Nina.

O.P. Nayar had developed the side of Geeta which had emerged with Baazi. Under his freewheeling baton, Geeta developed into a really hep singer who could belt out any number - soft, sultry, happy, snappy, romantic, teasing or tragic. However by 1957, Geeta's marriage had run through rough weather and was on the rocks. Guru Dutt had gotten romantically involved with his new leading lady Waheeda Rehman. The breaking up of her marriage also began giving repurcussions on her career. To quieten things down, Guru Dutt launched a film Gauri (1957) with her in the lead. She was to be launched as a singing star and it was to be India's first film in cinemascope but the film was shelved after just a few days of shooting. This was the time when one heard complaints from music directors about her not being easily available for rehearsels and recordings.

In fact in 1957, when he fell out with Lata Mangeshkar, Burmanda was looking to make Geeta his main singer rather than upcoming Asha Bhosle. After all Geeta was a mature singer while Asha was still raw. But due to her troubled marraige Geeta was not able to practice in the style required by Burmanda who was a hard taskmaster regarding rehearsels. Consequently, Asha not only took her place but went beyond her. And to make things worse, Geeta began finding solace in drinks. In 1964, Guru Dutt, passed away. Geeta was a broken woman, shattered by his death. She suffered a nervous breakdown. When she recovered she found herself in a financial mess. she tried to resume singing again, cutting discs at Durga Puja and giving stage shows and even doing a Bengali film Bhadu Bharan (1967) as heroine. But her health kept failing as she drank herself to a point of no return. Anubhav (1971), was her last film and was one of the finest work she ever did. She passed away of Cirrhosis of the Liver in 1972 at the age of 41.

External link

• Geeta Dutt at the Internet Movie Database

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