Bar girls want to sway to Jhalak Dikhla Jaa...
Santosh Andhale
Tough as it is to explain, Himesh Reshammiya and his nasal twang have registered a few more fans. A majority of the former bar girls say, whenever they return to the bar dance floor, they would prefer to sway to Reshammiya's songs. And the song has to be: 'Jhalak Dikhla Jaa'.
"We have been practising dancing on his songs in the privacy of our rooms," said a bar girl, adding with a smile, "Now that the ban has been lifted, we can take it to the dance floor. I'm sure just about every bar in the city will soon be rocking with Reshammiya's numbers."
For four months, Fareeda, a bar girl from Ghatkopar's Ramabai Colony, said they had only been waiting. With a childish excitement, she added, "We are all planning to start our rehearsals again. We will be back in demand. We will be dancing again."
Once the dances were banned, waiters at a bar complained, orchestras were reduced to playing melancholic songs demanded by patrons. "Who wants to listen to Mohammad Rafi and Mukesh nowadays? You can't dance to them," said a bar girl from Grant Road.
Everyone seems to concur. A Ramesh, a disc jockey who works in Ocean Bar in Mumbai Central, grumbled customers were forcing him to play old songs. He said, once the dancing resumes, "new songs would be back as well. I'll enjoy it more."
"Reshammiya's songs are fun and cheerful. Now that the gloom has lifted, we will be back singing livelier songs," said the girl from Grant Road. Now that would, indeed, be music to Reshammiya's ears.