Hindi Films of the 50s in Greece:

Memory of interactions in a bygone era

Helen Abadzi
habadzi@gmail.com
February 2009
Most people know that Alexander the Great conquered northwest India in 327 CE. But
very few people know that India conquered the heart of Greece around 1960. Not even Indians
know of this remarkable event. The invasion started in 1954 and took place on the screens of
working-class movie houses. The generals were Greek movie importers, and the missiles were
about 111 films. The vanguard was Aan, that movie importers renamed Mangala, the Rose of
India. Thereafter came Saqi, called Rosana, the Rose of Baghdad. Then followed a movie
on a topic that always moved Greeks, Sikandar, Alexander the Great. How was this possible?
The economic condition of Greece was bleak in the early 1950s. World War II and a
subsequent civil war with communist insurgents had destroyed the countryside and killed many
inhabitants. An atmosphere of depression and mourning prevailed as people tried to rebuild their
lives. One survival tactic was migration to larger cities (such as Athens) and emigration to
countries like Germany, which needed cheap labor. It was in that climate of desperation that
Hindi movies made an indelible impression.
The plots of the 1950s Hindi movies resonated with the wounded Greek psyche.
Suffering women, street children who had to drop out of school, jealous sisters-in-law, vengeful
mothers-in-law, interdependencies, betrayals, and frequent unhappy ends resonated with the
difficult choices of poorly educated Greek people subsisting in large cities. But there were also
diversions: palaces, jungles, elephants, and medieval-period costumes. Thus, India managed to
package and export to Greece its main problem, poverty, with its main attraction, exoticism.

Hindi film posters outside movie

theaters

Mother India

Newspaper advertisements

At least 111 movies are known to have been imported in 1954-1968. They were most
popular in 1958-1962, when at least one out of the 35 movietheaters of Thessaloniki played one
or two Hindi movies in per week. (For example, Awaara in 1957 played for six weeks in
Thessaloniki.) The films were always subtitled in Greek. They were considered working-class
fare, but masterpieces were seen by many. For example, Mother India played somewhere in
Greece for at least 10 years. The movies established Nargis as the great priestess of the family
dramas, with Madhubala a close second.
Eventually, Greek producers imitated the Hindi success recipes. The result was Greek
films with 8-12 songs (mainly set in bouzouki night-club scenes) and tragic plots and titles.
But also, a considerable number of songs wer adapted from Hindi movies. From the 111
movies known to have come as well as from others whose importation is uncertain, 105 Greek
renditions were identified. Many came from the best known movies, that is from Awaara, Sri
420, Mother India, Ghar Sansaar, Laajwanti, and Aan. The songs engendered duplicates,
triplicates, and quadruplicates. For example, Pyar hua ikrar hua (Sri 420) and Gao tarane man
ke (Aan) have four renditions, "Unchhi, unchhi dunia ki divare~" (Naagin) and "Aajao taRapt
hai arma~" (Awaara) have three. At least 10 others have duplicates. Of all songs, 57 (55%)
have a great similarity with pre-existing songs; 25 (24%) deviate significantly from the originals,
16 (16%) are partial renditions, where other melodies are mixed with Hindi, and 5 (5%) use only
some musical bars.
Since there were practically no Hindi-speaking Greeks at the time and movies did not
clearly render the words of the songs, the lyrics of the Hindi and Greeks songs almost never
coincided. The principal concern of the Greeks then was migration abroad and separation from
loved ones. Thus, a large number of the Hindi songs were transformed into emigration dirges,
often depicting the lonely dependent mother waiting for a son to return. One version of Gao
tarane man ke became the bitter letter which tells the recipient that the beloved will not
return. Pyar hua ikrar hua (Sri 420), a song well known for its optimism, yielded four Greek
versions, each one a sad emigration song. The best known version starts with the sound of the
cursed train departing for Germany and describes Tears are rolling in the station, mothers
wailing disconsolately.
The transformed songs had a big problem: plagiarism. With few exceptions, the songs appeared
as creations of at least 26 Greek musicians. Copyright laws were lax or non-existent at that time,
and the bardic tradition (dating from Homeric times) of adapting existing melodies to suit the
conditions of the time was still strong. The scandal could not be hidden for long. Audiences
often did remember the movie originals, and the outcry started a controversy that raged for years.
The notable Greek composer and bouzouki virtuoso, Vasilis Tsitsanis, railed against the
plagiarists in articles published in popular magazines. He considered the Indian composers
giants, whose creations were shamelessly expropriated by worthless musicians. The accusations
of plagiarism stuck with some folk composers, and Hindi songs became their shame; the
sometimes excellent pieces were hidden and forgotten. Also, by the end of the 60s, the economic
conditions of Greece greatly improved, and the demand for family dramas and for songs with
themes of emigration, poverty, and depression decreased. So, after 1968, the Hindi movies and
songs gradually became a distant memory.
However, about 11 have survived for more than 40 years. These include Madhubala
(Aajao tarapt hai arma~ from Awaara) one of three renditions of this song by Stellios
Kazantzidis; kardia mou kaimeni (my poor heart - dunia me ham aaye from Mother India),

auti i nyxta menei (this night remains - ulfaT ka saaz chheRo from the 1953 Aurat), oso
axizeis esy (as much as you are worth - duniawalon se duur from Ujaala). One can hear
them played by radio stations that specialize in bouzouki songs as well as background music in
public spaces. The Indians visiting Greece or Greek restaurants should watch for them.

Forty years later, in the 2004 Olympics, Sunil Dutt visited Greece as Minister of Youth and
Sports. Several newspapers noted the event and reminded their readers of the fame he once had
in Greece.

Sunil Dutt and Emmanuel Tasoulas, collector of old Hindi movie posters
and author, at the beginning of the 2004 Olympics

Hindi films became popular in many countries the outside indic world, such as Russia,
Turkey, Tunisia, Egypt, Uganda, even Colombia. But it appears that Hindi songs were not
copied outside South Asia as widely as they were copied in Greece. Songs often sound vaguely
familiar to Greeks, like the traditional songs of many areas in Greece, including Asia Minor and
the islands. One gets the impression that one once heard a similar tune and forgot it.
Musicologists who have studied Indian music have been impressed by certain patterns of
similarities and have written about them. It was this similarity perhaps that the folkloric
musicians, particularly the Asia Minor refugees, noted.
Musical relationships may be are related to cultural and linguistic relationships in the
distant past. Attested contacts between Greeks and Indians date at least from the 6th century

BCE, when some Asia Minor Greeks and some western Indians were citizens of the Persian
empire. Alexanders invasion and contacts lasted only six years, but closer interactions
followed during the Hellenistic era, when Seleukid generals established around 256 BCE the
Bactrian and Indogreek kingdoms. Their rulers are mainly known from the thousands of coins
they left behind, the many Greco-buddhist statues, and Gandhara art. For the next thousand
years, there were mutual cultural influences that encompassed the Christian monastic life,
astronomy, and medicine. Contacts were reduced after the Arab conquest of contemporary
Pakistan and eventually of the Byzantine empire in 1453.

Ancient Indogreek coins found in India and

Pakistan

Greco-Buddhist status from Gandhara

When one looks at history globally, it becomes evident that the movie craze of the 50s60s was merely the latest chapter of a dialogue that has lasted at least 3000 years. The copying
events should be seen as a positive cultural phenomenon. The musicians that used the songs
heard a distant sound of a common cultural past, which they tried to transmit. In turn, this article
transmits it to the readers of the 21st century.

The author, Helen Abadzi, with Naushad Ali in Mumbai in 1998

This article is abstracted from the book Hindi-Style Songs Revealed by Helen Abadzi
and Emmanuel Tasoulas, Athens, Atrapos Publishers, 1998.