Baat Niklegi toh Phir by Sathya Saran

Author:Sathya Saran [Saran, Sathya]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: gnv64
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers India
Published: 2016-04-15T00:00:00+00:00

LITTLE BABOO

LIFE WAS A GHAZAL

15

Even as their careers soared, the Singhs found great joy in their son. He was special. A darling boy, who was not just beautiful and obedient, but also seemed to be gifted with his parents’ talent for music. Perhaps the fact that he had slept in his mother’s arms as a twenty-day-old and backstage all through his infancy while his parents went from one show to the other, singing for hours on end, added to the natural gift.

Even before Chitra returned home from Breach Candy Hospital, six days after Baboo was born, Jagjit had appointed a servant exclusively to help her. ‘He was a good man, from Orissa, and could lift Baboo when, at four months, he grew to be a big baby who looked six or seven months old.’ Chitra devoted herself completely to her son. ‘He and Benjamin Spock were my life. I took care of him by the letter. And as if he had read the book too, Baboo cried all night, most nights!

‘Jagjit would be out, but on his return, he would immediately go to his son and pick him up. I would have walked him up and down, while he howled, but the moment his father held him, Baboo would quieten completely.’

Jagjit did offbeat things for his son. He would cut out lengths of mull and, layering them, stitch nappies for Baboo at night on Chitra’s sewing machine, while the boy slept peacefully as if knowing his father was near. He would bathe the child, or give him oil massages. ‘His touch was magical for the child, there was some special bond between them that I could not fathom.’

As Baboo grew up, Jagjit tried to spend as much time as he could with him, even though he was busy recording a series of albums and performing at shows. He was good at math and would teach the boy, while Chitra had the task of taking his English lessons. Until he turned six, they would take him to shows where he slept backstage through the performance. By the age of eight, he was playing the dholki on stage, starting with a show at Bombay’s Bhaidas Hall; the audience loved the trio!

‘Father and son were friends, he was not one bit scared of his father as so many children are,’ Chitra underlines. She enrolled Baboo in the Sophia Nursery. Then he moved to Miniland in Pheroza Godrej’s Cymroza Art Gallery. Jagjit would pick him up every day from there and take him to play cricket.

Even as a baby, when he could hardly reach the tabla top, Baboo would try to place his tiny hands on it and play. Jagjit recognized his interest and appointed a tabla master to teach him the basics. Chitra believes that was a mistake. ‘The regimentation drove him off, he just stopped playing the tabla. Later, he switched to drums.’

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