At a recent theatre and cultural festival Repertwahr Season 12, held in Lucknow, an interesting conversation took place between Javed Akhtar and Roshan Abbas writer and director. Among a host of topics like new-age poetry to marriage, one interesting anecdote, Akhtar shared was how the popular song Ek, Do, Teen from the film Tezaab which was filmed on Madhuri Dixit, came into being.
A still from the song Ek Do Teen
Javed Akhtar and Roshan Abbas during the session in Lucknow (BCCL/ Manas Mishra)
When asked about some of his iconic songs and how they came to be written, Akhtar narrated the story behind penning the iconic song Ek Do Teen. He revealed, “The brief for this song was that it was set in a nautanki type of set up. As a writer, I could not have written a song in Ghalib style for such a sequence. It had to match the setting of a typical rustic atmosphere of a nautanki. We were in a dilemma about what kind of song to write. One day, the music director, Laxmikant, told me he had heard a tune at a Ganpati puja pandal being played on the banjo which he had found quite catchy. I told him to sing the beat in dummy words. He sang the tune with dummy lyrics, using numbers, ‘1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6.’ I liked it so much that I said, ‘Why not use it as it is?’ He was hesitant, saying people would laugh at the song ki ‘ginti se gaana bana diya hai!’ I assured him and said don’t worry, I’ll write it in a way that the whole song will be based on numbers yet have all the emotions. That’s how the song Ek Do Teen came about,” recalled Akhtar.