The World of Salil Chowdhury

Ritwik Ghatak introduced Bimal Roy to Salil when Ritwik and Salil were planning to make a film called "Rikshawallah" based on a story written by Salil. Bimal Roy became quite interested in that story and sent a telegram to Salil on his return to Mumbai to come to Mumbai immediately. That was July 1952. The telegram arrived the day Salil got married to Jyoti Chowdhury. The result was the phenomenally sucessful film "Do Bigha Zameen". "Rikshawaala" was eventually made and released in 1955.The story and the music was by Salil and the film was directed by Satyen Bose. Its a great pity that the song "aay re o pousali bataasey " was never released. This is one of Salil's earlier compositions from the '40s during the IPTA days. Mach later, in 1959 Salil composed a wonderful hindi version of this song "naach re dharti ke pyaare " (lyrics: Shailendra) in the film "Heera Moti" although the music director for "Heera Moti" was Roshan.
The other song "Siyaram siyaram" was released on a 78rpm record ( N76006) along with another wonderful non-film Salil composition "Ab machal uthhaa hai dariyaa" (lyrics: Govind Munshi) which was often performed by Bombay Youth Choir.