There is so much to learn from Rahman - the human being isnt it? to be
half as good as him is great enough.
On Feb 28, 2009, at 8:26 PM, Gopal Srinivasan wrote:
At Which Time Dilip Became Rahman
The Music and the Maker, the maestro's faith in Islam has found the
twain makes for perfect
consonance
SHEELA REDDY ON A.R. RAHMAN
Meeting someone for an hour-long interview is no entry ticket to a
man’s soul, but with A.R.
Rahman it seemed like that. The first time I met him was in November
’98 when he’d come to
Delhi to accept a Channel V viewers’ award for most popular track of
the year. Some three
million viewers had voted for him, which wasn’t surprising,
considering how his music was
already conquering the film world, both in Tamil and Hindi. But what
was unusual was the song
this post-Chitrahaar, Def Leppard-adoring generation chose as their
favourite song of the year,
Vande Mataram. By then, a countrywide row had broken out over the
compulsory singing of this
‘national song’ in schools, but Rahman’s popular, flag-waving
rendering of it (Maa Tujhe
Salaam) was met everywhere, especially among the young, with foot-
tapping enthusiasm. I had to
find out for myself how this young man with Jesus Christ locks, blue
jeans and Muslim name had
so cleverly subverted the mullahs and the Hindu fundoos by getting a
whole generation hooked to
it.
That’s the best part of being a journalist, even a freelance one—you
can go with a question to
anyone, anywhere, and get your answer straight from the horse’s
mouth. If you know how to reach
it, of course. Rahman was easy—I just had to call the Channel V pro.
Within hours, I was
sitting in a hotel suite with this quiet young man with large, still
eyes and hands, dressed
all in black—black jacket, black trousers, black shoes—chatting not
only about the genesis of
his award-winning song (the brainchild of ad film buddy Bharatbala—
they both wanted to create a
song that would make patriotism hip). But as often happens in such
moments of enforced
intimacy, we ended up talking of much more. Such as how he converted
to Islam 10 years earlier,
when he was 21.
It started, he said, when his father was dying. Rahman was only 11
years old then, the middle
child between two sisters. Having tried everything else and failed,
the family turned to a
local pir. "My father was very ill then, bed-ridden, and the pir
sahib couldn’t do anything for
him at that last stage." But even after his father died, Rahman’s
family still turned to the
pir for emotional support. And then one day, nearly 10 years later,
the pir sahib came to
Rahman’s home. "He blessed a room which is very special to me
because my father died in it, and
which I had turned into my studio. The pir sahib said we were
destined to go through some
unique experiences, including much suffering, and some very hard
times." His prophecy had a
curious effect on Rahman: "The moment he said that and blessed the
room, I felt such peace. As
if everything had become green, and my whole life had started afresh."
Within six months, the pir was dead, but the mystical power he had
unleashed on the family
lived on. That’s when Rahman says the family decided to embrace
Islam. "I felt that, OK, this
feeling that I have is God. It’s not about Hindu or Muslim or
anything, but there is that one
feeling, and that is God." It was not anything dramatic, he
explained, "like it is in films".
"It would be hypocritical," he felt, with the dawning of this
feeling, if he didn’t change his
name. And so, Dilip Kumar became Allah Rakha Rahman at the age of
21. For Rahman and his
family, the conversion was more a change in their attitude to God
than anything else. "In
fact," he pointed out, "if you take ancient Hindu scriptures, the
Rig Veda, it says God is
one." It’s the mystical aspects of the namaaz that he valued the
most, Rahman said. "Prayer is
more like a meditation for me. And it helps me clean my inner self.
I go through death five
times a day when I pray and I am born again. When I start, I feel I
am dead and my soul has
departed and when I finish my prayers I am back.I am born again."
Is it like that each time, I wanted to know. He laughed at my
atheist’s curiosity. "I try to
make it like that each time, but sometimes there is so much turmoil
in the head, so much
happening...." And what if he’s recording when it’s time for his
prayers? "I have a small
prayer room next to the studio, and my sister takes over the
recording till my prayers are
done." And if he’s travelling? "I carry my prayer mat wherever I go."
In all faith: with wife Saira
Did it make any difference, getting work as A.R. Rahman instead of
Dilip Kumar? "In my field,"
he said, "it doesn’t matter whether you are Hindu or Muslim. If you
are good, you stay; if you
are bad, you get thrown out." On the other hand, he said, his new
religion helped him get the
right attitude to work: to keep his sense of balance and distance.
"It’s your attitude in life
that brings you success," he said. "So I’ve taken (from Islam)
whatever helps me to get into
that attitude." His music and Islam became inextricably linked
together.
Interview over, Rahman started his own grilling. I was working then
for a street children’s
organisation and he wanted to know more. It’s written in the Quran,
he said, that a person must
donate one-third of his earnings to charity, and he was always on
the lookout for deserving
organisations he could send a donation to. Soon he left to catch a
plane, and I forgot about
the promise. Until several months later, when there was a call from
his office in Chennai:
could I please tell them who Mr Rahman should send a cheque to? The
cheque arrived, I forget
for how much—Rs 1 lakh, I think, or more. But what touched me most
was that he should remember,
and had taken the trouble.
We met again four years later. By then Rahman had film producers
queueing up night and day at
his state-of-the-art studio in Chennai, and was also a world
celebrity, having worked with
Andrew Lloyd Webber, Michael Jackson and J Lo. When we arrived at
his hotel room, a pretty
young woman was slipping out. "A girlfriend," guessed the
photographer, experienced in the ways
of celebrity lifestyles. "Probably a journalist," I said, not
wanting the pir-like man I
remembered to have gone the way of other film celebrities.
It was November ’02, possibly the worst time in independent India’s
history to be a Muslim. The
talk inevitably strayed to what it must be like to be a Muslim in
these post-Gujarat riots
time. But he had no regrets: "You can’t change your identity just
because of politics," he told
me wisely. "I am also a Tamilian—I can’t say, no, I won’t be a
Tamilian because I may be
mistaken for the LTTE."
He was still devoutly religious, insisting that it was what inspired
his life and music.
"Within religion’s boundaries, I am very free. It helps me to take
success and failure in a
balanced way, rather than jumping up and down or brooding."
The mystery woman returned, possibly because we were lingering for
longer than either she or
Rahman had anticipated. But he didn’t introduce her to us, and all
of us complied silently with
the rules of mental purdah that he set: pretending as if there was a
wall between her and us.
But today, watching her walk the red carpet arm in arm with Rahman,
I know who she is: his
wife, Saira. And thank (his) God that he hasn’t changed.
http://www.outlookindia.com/fullprint.asp?choice=1&fodname=20090309&fname=Cover+Story&sid=5
