Lataji doesn’t suffer fools. That she has borne with me for more than 30 years is proof of the fact that she doesn’t consider me a fool. Two questions that I am always asked about her are, does she sing for you, and has she ever been angry with you? The answer to the first question is, no. I’ve never asked her to sing for me. It is as absurd as asking a music conductor to conduct an orchestra during a social meeting. But believe it or not, I sing to her. On her birthday, I insist on singing Happy Birthday to her.
“Aapke himmat ki daad deni padegi,” says my dear friend Shabana Azmi.
And how does Lataji react to my singing? She laughs, that musical laughter of hers in which we can hear the sound a child’s innocence, and she once said, “Aapke liye yeh bhi bardasht karna manzoor hai.”
As for the other question, has she ever lost her temper with me? Yes once, when after something I wrote all hell had broken loose. She was upset and she didn’t hide it. I rang her up after a few weeks ready to be told to buzz off. Instead, she greeted me warmly and said, ‘Arrey aap kahan hain?”