India’s reigning star Noor Jehan built Pakistan’s film industry, earned 5x more than peers
Noor jehan, often credited as ‘Pakistan’s Lata Mangeshkar’ in India, she was Malika-e-Tarannum (Queen of Melody) to her followers across the border. Familiar to the current generation as the voice behind ‘Sanu Nehr Vale Pul’,or the Faiz Ahmed Faiz creation ‘Mujhse Pehli Si Mohabbat’, Noor Jehan started her career in Bombay (now Mumbai) in the 1930s, and went to Pakistan after the Partition. There, she emerged as one of the most respected and celebrated singers from the subcontinent. Amid comparisons between them, Lata Mangeshkar herself credited her as the ‘role model’. After Noor Jehan died, Mangeskar said in an interview, “Everyone has role models. And I have no qualms in admitting that Noor Jehan was mine. We listened to Noor Jehan in childhood and grew with her notes in mind.”
From a child actor to the biggest star in pre-Partition India
Noor Jehan started working in the movies in the 1930s as a child artist, and by the 1940s, she was playing lead roles. She started her career in Bengal, moved to Bombay as a young actor, and with the 1942 film Khandaan, she became a star. The film also starred Pran. Khandaan brought Noor Jehan the kind of stardom that many heroines had not experienced until then. She was singing her own songs, was a stunning beauty with oodles of charm, and was an enchantress on screen. Her vocals left the audience mesmerised, and not just them; even her film Khandaan’s director, Shaukat Hussain Rizvi, was completely in awe of her.
Noor Jehan started her career as a child actor in India in the 1930s. (Photo: Express Archives)
Their relationship started on set despite the producer raising his objections, as he feared that his film could suffer if their romance went bad. As per Aijaz Gul’s book Noorjehan: The Melody Queen, producer Dalsukh M Pancholi sued Rizvi, saying that he had kidnapped Noor Jehan. In court, Noor Jehan presented herself and dismissed the matter, saying Rizvi was like her brother. When her actual brother beat her up to get her to break up with Rizvi, she secretly married the man she loved. And later, when the family sued Rizvi, complaining that he was holding her hostage, her husband counter-sued them and made them leave the city.
The success of Khandaan led Noor Jehan to work in many films in Bombay, the most notable being the Dilip Kumar-starrer Jugnu. She had had a few hits, and was starting to become one of the most bankable names in the industry as she, unlike many others, had the two skills that were most loved in the movies – acting and singing. But when all seemed to be going well for Noor Jehan, it was declared that the country would be divided into two. And she decided to come back home, and for her, that home was Pakistan, for that’s where she was born.
Setting up a studio in Lahore, first female director in Pakistan
Films were the last thing on anyone’s mind in Pakistan as the newly built country was still finding its feet. Many prominent film industry folks, including Mehboob Khan, spent some time in Lahore but realised that the infrastructure they had in Bombay was a distant dream here. They came back to India, but not Noor Jehan. She took on the challenge, and along with her husband, who at one point wanted to start an electric bulb factory, decided to build the industry from scratch. Lahore had a flourishing film industry before Partition, but that wasn’t the case now as the city had gone through immense turmoil in the preceding months. Studios were burnt down, and to start it all up again required some hard labour. Noor Jehan and her husband bought an old studio, and built it up again.
Noor Jehan and Ghulam Haider at Shahnoor studios in Lahore. (Photo: Express Archives)
Three years later, Noor Jehan became the first woman to direct a film, and became one of the pioneers of the Pakistani film industry. Her film Chan Way, which also starred her and featured her vocals, was a massive hit, and became one of the earliest hits of Pakistan.
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Singer, actress, entrepreuner, mother – and extremely wise about money
Noor Jehan was already a mother of three by this time but knew how to strike the perfect work-life balance. She was a full-time working mother who hired enough help to manage everything with ease. She was running a studio, directing and acting in films, singing, and being a mother – and she did it all. Of course, one can now imagine that this wasn’t seen honourably by the larger society, for who could imagine a woman in the 1950s who was financially independent and did not seek her husband’s permission to make her own decisions?
It was only a matter of time before rumours about her affairs were circulated and men who considered themselves to be the decision makers of society started pulling her down, but Noor Jehan stayed put. Unlike many of her contemporaries, she was rather wise about her money and made sure that her home was in her name, and even the studio she had set up with her husband was co-owned by her.
Other singers were paid PKR 350, Noor Jehan was paid PKR 2,000
As she got more and more famous, the cracks in her marriage started to widen, and eventually, it ended in divorce. However, shortly after, Noor Jehan married again. In 1959, she married up-and-comer Ejaz Durrani, who was on his way to becoming a major star in Pakistani movies. From this marriage, she gave birth to three daughters. Ejaz wanted Noor Jehan to quit acting in movies, and she agreed. It seemed quite uncharacteristic for her to bow down to someone else’s whims, and thus, her fans have come to believe that since she had had a good run in the movies, she now wanted to focus on singing.
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Noor Jehan was extremely wise with her money. (Photo: Express Archives)
After she quit acting, Noor Jehan’s musical career saw a new level of success. Until quitting films in 1961, Noor Jehan had been known for playback singing, primarily for her own movies, but now, sky was the limit, and she made the most of it. While other singers would get paid PKR 350 (roughly PKR 70,000, adjusted for inflation) per film song, she would earn PKR 2,000 (roughly PKR 4 lakh, adjusted for inflation), as per Aijaz Gul. She was known for her Urdu and Punjabi songs, and started travelling the world with her music.
A decade or so later, her marriage with Ejaz ended as well. The men left, but Noor Jehan was still standing by her children, with her finances in place. Since she had always been extremely particular about being financially independent, Noor Jehan never found herself in a spot where she had to worry about her or her children’s future.
When Noor Jehan pulled a producer by the ear, escorted him out fo her studio
While this saved her from a lot of troubles that women of that era had to face, this also meant that the men with bruised egos wouldn’t think twice before dragging her name through the mud. Everything – from secret affairs to accusations about her character – became gossip, and as usually is the case, such gossip travelled well, even if it wasn’t true. In a video shared on her 20th death anniversary on her daughter Hina Durrani’s YouTube channel, three of her daughters recalled that their mother “was a very brave woman to survive in that industry. She went with dignity and made sure everyone respected her.” Everyone knew no one could mess with her.
Once, her daughter recalled, a film producer barged into her recording studio and requested that she sing for him as he had invested money in the film she was recording for. Noor Jehan got up, pulled him by the ear, and escorted him out, as everyone watched in stunned silence. She knew when someone was appreciating her art versus when they were trying to cross a line.
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Noor Jehan was a woman in a man’s world, and she knew she had to make them respect her. (Photo: Express Archives)
Noor Jehan’s 6 kids got an allownace of PKR 35,000/month each (roughly PKR 50 lakh)
Noor Jehan didn’t marry a third time and lived an extremely busy life with her work and her six children. And despite being a workhorse, she pampered her children to no end. She sent her three young daughters to boarding school when her second marriage was going through a tough time as she had the foresight to protect them against domestic disturbance. But even when the children lived away, she would constantly treat them with gifts. For instance, when she would send mangoes to her daughters, she would send enough for the entire school. As per Aijaz Gul, in the 1970s, she would give an allowance of PKR 35,000 per month (roughly PKR 50 lakh, adjusted for inflation) to each of her children, which was a massive amount in those days.
The relationship wasn’t just transactional, as she had a special connection with each of her kids, and almost all of them cared for her until her last days. Her last six years were spent in and out of hospitals in Pakistan, London and the US, but through it all, her children were by her side. She knew that her property could cause a rift between them after her passing so she sold most of assets before her death, and distributed the money amongst her children. She lived a lavish and luxurious life, a life she had made for herself.
Noor Jehan passed away in 2000. (Photo: Express Archives)
Noor Jehan’s only visit to India in 1982
In 1982, Noor Jehan got a chance to visit India, the only visit she made since Partition, and as per own admission, she was in tears when she landed. In a chat with Dilip Kumar on Doordarshan, she recalled the days they spent filming together back in the 1940s. Her daughters recalled that when she was leaving from Pakistan, there was a problem at immigration as they believed that her documents were incomplete. She got emotional as she knew that this was her only chance to visit India and as she landed, she received a warm welcome from the entire film industry, including Lata Mangeshkar.
In 1996, Noor Jehan recorded for the last time, but decades later, her voice still echoes in the homes of countless South Asians all over the world. She passed away in 2000 at the age of 74.
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