How Vasanth Kumar Padukone got ‘re-named’ as the legendary film-maker-actor ‘Guru Dutt’ ? Younger brother producer Devi Dutt (‘Masoom’) reveals the ‘gehra raaz’ ! by Chaitanya Padukone

Today 09th July 2024 is the 99th birth anniversary of legendary film-maker-actor Guru Dutt! The centenary (100th) year celebration starts this week with Guru Dutt’s classic movies and evergreen music who has a massive global cult-fan-following!  Acclaimed mainly for his impactful shot-taking and innovative song- picturisations in his classic Hindi movies. The (light-shadow contrast) visuals shot marvelously by his regular super-talented cinematographer V K Murthy have been have been a benchmark-reference for Bollywood as also the international film-fraternity.

Not many are aware, as to how Guru Dutt  actually got his ‘screen-name’.  As is known, the enigmatic music-savvy director-actor was born as Vasanth Kumar Padukone. On the legendary film-maker’s  99th birth anniversary his younger brother and noted Bollywood producer  Devi Dutt ( of ‘Masoom’ fame )  jogs into memory lane as he unravels the off-screen ‘GD’ mystique.

Devi-ji recalls,

Recalls Devi-jee, “ When Guru was about 18 months old, he was about to drown in a  nearby ‘well’, but he was forcibly hoisted and saved by my grandmother. Spiritual godman Swami Ramdas who studied Vasanth`s horoscope decided to change his name to Gurudutt. In 1950,  it was his ‘mentor’ director Gyan Mukherjee who made him drop his surname and split-up his name as Guru Dutt.

This proved ‘lucky’ as he got his break-thru in 1951 as an independent director in Dev Anand`s ‘Baazi’,” informs the 83-year-old talented movie-producer who had the privilege of working with his ‘genius’ brother for 11 years. Devi-jee recalls having joined Guru Dutt with the movie ‘Pyaasa’ (1957) as a trainee sound-man and boom-man assisting the senior recordist Majid.

“The shoot was for the evergreen song ‘Jaane Kya Tuney Kahee’ picturized on Waheeda Rehman.  After the first stanza (antara)  was shot successfully I was appreciated for my handling of the sound. During the second stanza, I made a slight blunder while cue-ing. But Guru Dutt was quite understanding and supportive since I was raw and new,” smiles Devi-jee who also reveals Guru Dutt’s unfulfilled dreams.

“Among Guru-ji’s ambitious dream-plans was to re-develop and transform his 48 Pali Bungalow into an eight-storey building where all us could stay together as one united family, He was also frantically trying to save our most expensive air-conditioned Stage No.4 in Guru Dutt Studios from demolition by the Municipal Corporation to accommodate the widening of Western Express Highway.

He was also planning to return to direction and to produce our first Eastman Color Film ‘Kaneez’  in Cinemascope starring Simi Garewal and Feroz Khan. But none of these dreams got fulfilled due to his sudden accidental death due to an unintentional overdose of sleeping pills on Oct 10th 1964.”

Laments  Devi  Dutt who has on-screen dedicated his  1983 classic musical Naseer-Shabana-Jugal starrer  ‘Masoom’ to the memory of “my mentors Geeta Dutt and Guru Dutt” in the rolling credit-titles.

Guru Dutt ---all-time Six musical movie-classics: Pyaasa’, ‘ Chaudhvin Ka Chaand’; ‘Kaagaz Ke Phool‘; ‘Saheb Bibi Aur Ghulam’; ‘Mr. & Mrs. ‘55’ (comedy) and ‘Aar Paar’,

Pyaasa

Chaudhvin Ka Chaand

Kaagaz Ke Phool

Saheb Bibi Aur Ghulam

Mr.& Mrs.55

Aar Paar

(The writer of this interview-news-story Chaitanya Padukone is a Dadasaheb Phalke Academy award-winning eminent senior film-journalist--author of memoirs book R D Burmania)

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