She had much softer and sweeter voice with a narrow range than the leading singers of the time,
Zohrabai Ambalewali,
Amirbai Karnataki and
Shamshad Begum. In the next two decades, she sang for 100 films, till the early 1950s, when
Lata Mangeshkar changed the playback-singing scene in India.
Career She was 10 years old when she recorded her first song for
His Master's Voice in 1934 and she started her career as a stage artiste.
Vijay Bhatt and Shankar Bhatt of
Prakash Pictures spotted her during one of her shows. They liked her voice and persuaded her to discontinue acting on stage as it would spoil her voice (In those days, there were no microphones and you had to shout to be heard). So she quit theatre, and became an employee of Prakash Pictures as an actress and singer. Rajkumari's first film with them was a
Hindi-
Gujarati bilingual called
Sansar Leela Nayi Duniya. She got important roles in films like
Aankh Ka Tara and
Turki Sher (1933). She was the heroine in
Bhakt Ke Bhagwan and
Insaaf Ki Topi (1934). In those days she often acted opposite
Zakaria Khan (late actor
Amjad Khan's father, whose screen name was Jayant). She also used to sing for popular music director Lallubhai. He gave music to films starring Rajkumari ji like
Nai Duniya, alias
Sacred Scandal (1934) (Sansaar Leela in Gujarati version),
Laal Chitthi, alias
Red Letter (1935),
Bombay Mail (1935),
Bambai Ki Sethaani (1935) and
Shamsheer-e-Arab (1935). She began getting fed up with having to watch on her figure and decided to stick to just singing as a career. After she quit Prakash Pictures, she began playback singing for actresses like Ratnamala,
Shobhana Samarth, etc. and soon she became the first female playback singer of Indian cinema. She sang many
Gujarati and
Punjabi songs. Even though she was not formally trained to sing, she was very good at picking up what her composers taught her. They thought she was a trained singer! She was able to also establish herself as a classical singer and excelled in singing and voice production within the framework of classical forms of thumri and dadra. Among her peers were
Shamshad Begum,
Zohrabai Ambalewali,
Juthika Roy,
Zeenat Begum, etc. Both Shamshad and Zohrabai had resounding voices with a high range, while Rajkumari had a soft and very sweet voice with a small range. She sang quite a few songs with Talat Mahmood and
Mukesh. She did not get much opportunity to sing with
Mohammed Rafi – mainly because
Lata Mangeshkar was a fast upcoming singer at the time. She sang with
Noor Jehan in
Naukar (1943). She never sang with
K. C. Dey, but she did sing songs composed by him, as well as his nephew,
Manna Dey. She also sang many popular Punjabi-language film songs for the veteran Punjabi music directors
Hansraj Behl and
Sardul Kwatra in the 1950s.
Later life Rajkumari was married very late in life. Her husband was V.K. Dubey who was from
Benares, (
Uttar Pradesh) where he spent a lot of his time (because he owned a shop there), while she settled in
Bombay. He later joined her in
Bombay. Rajkumari Dubey died in 2000. During her career, she would go on to sing songs for
Neel Kamal, a Raj Kapoor and Madhubala starrer, and
Hulchul (1951); but her two most famous films would be
Bawre Nain (1950), where she sang for
Geeta Bali "Sun Bairi Baalam Sach Bol Re" and
Mahal (1949), where she sang "Ghabrekar Ke Jo Hum Sir Ko Takraayan" picturised on
Vijayalakshmi and "Chun Chun Gunguruva Baje Jhumba", a duet with
Zohrabai Ambalawali. By this time, however,
Lata Mangeshkar had shot to fame, relegating many female singers in the industry to the sidelines. She sang her only song for
O. P. Nayyar in the 1952 movie
Aasmaan, which was his debut movie; "Jab Se Pee Piya Aan Base". The story goes that he was considering
Lata Mangeshkar for the song. (Rest of the songs of the movie are sung by
Geeta Dutt and
C. H. Atma). When somebody told this to Lata, she said something about him which led to a misunderstanding. Angered, O. P. Nayyar made Rajkumari sing this song and never repeated her. He never used Lata to sing for him as well. Rajkumari endured a long dry spell until music director Naushad spotted her singing in the chorus for his background score for
Pakeezah (1972). Naushad was much taken aback by this, having greatly respected her in her heyday, and heartbroken to hear that she was reduced to singing in the chorus to make ends meet. As a result, he gave her an entire song to herself in
Pakeezah,
Najariya ki Mari. Her last film song was recorded for R. D. Burman in the film
Kitaab; "Har Din Jo Beeta". Rajkumari also appeared in a British TV programme called
Mahfil on
Channel 4, a Samandar Films production, produced by Firdous Ali and Mahmood Jamal. In this programme, she sang a set of her famous film songs and ghazals; the caption on one of the songs, "Yeh raat phir na aayge", from the film
Mahal, cites that the song was pictured on Zohra (and not
Madhubala or Vijayalaxmi). The programme was aired on 24 March 1991. Rajkumari died in poverty in early 2000. ==Discography==