When Shailendra went bankrupt after failure of his first and only film starring friend Raj Kapoor

December 14 marks the birth anniversary of legendary actor-filmmaker Raj Kapoor. By a huge stroke of coincidence, the date also commemorates the death anniversary of one of Raj Kapoor’s most frequent collaborators and closest friends in the business - song lyricist Shailendra. 

Shailendra began his career in the 1940s as a song-writer, and achieved fame for his iconic songs like Awara Hoon, Mera Joota Hai Japani. It was not until the mid 1960s that the simple-minded lyricist even considered producing films. He ended up producing one film in that time period, with his close friend Raj Kapoor. And unfortunately, that film ended up playing a big part in his decline, and eventual demise.

The film Teesri Kasam, which marked the debut of maverick filmmaker Basu Bhattacharya, was a rather unconventional storyline by Hindi cinema standards of those times - telling the story of two vagabonds whose paths intertwine by fate before being cut loose again. 

Unfortunately, the film’s production ended up taking much longer than expected.  As Shailendra’s son Dinesh recalled in an interview years later,  Shailendra was plagued with problems, literally from day one. Not only were his distributors demanding commercial compromises, there were many in his unit, people he trusted, who only wanted to make money from the project. “My father was swindled left, right and centre. Everyone made money from Teesri Kasam…everyone but my father.”

Shailendra had initially planned to shoot the film in the cowbelt of UP and Bihar till the fear of dacoits lead him to contemplate a change of location. His wife’s brother suggested that they move to Bina, a small town near Sagar in Madhya Pradesh. In hindsight, Shailendra's family realised It was foolish carting the cast and crew to Bina when the film could easily have been shot on the outskirts of Mumbai. 

A few days into film's shoot, a study of the accounts revealed that 17-18 suits had been stitched for a film whose hero wore only dhotis.  Shailendra was also conned into buying a couple of bullocks so “continuity” could be maintained.  The shoots in Bina slowly drained Shailendra’s accounts.

The film took four years to complete. Even when it finally limped to the finish, Shailendra was advised by many to change the ending. “Hirabai and Hiraman have to come together. You need a happy ending.” But Shailendra stuck to his guns.

The film was released in Delhi-UP first. Unfortunately, Shailendra had stood guarantee for some distributors and there was a legal problem during the film’s release. What made matters worse worse was that Teesri Kasam never picked up in collections and was pulled out of theatres on day 3 of business.

Shailendra was shattered by the debacle. After Teesri Kasam’s disastrous first run in Delhi-UP, it was as if the creative force within Shailendra had died - even though he was at the peak of his career in ’66 when Teesri Kasam was released. Soon, Shailendra just lost interest in writing poetry…in life itself. With the kind of money he was making as a song writer he could have covered the losses of Teesri Kasam in six months - but it was not so much the financial losses that he suffered that hurt Shailendra as the betrayal of friends and family in whom he had invested so much trust. 

He started drinking heavily. It was an overdose of alcohol that eventually killed him. Teesri Kasam was released in September ’66. On December 13, he was admitted to the hospital. The following day he was gone. December 14 was Raj Kapoor’s birthday. 

Later, When Teesri Kasam was released in ‘67 in Mumbai, it drew huge crowds to the theatres. It was selected for the Moscow International Film Festival in ’67 and was well-received as a classic. In ’66, it won the President’s Gold Medal for Best Film. The money took its time coming in. Teesri Kasam was counted amongst the classics by Doordarshan and screened many times on the national network. Though the film went over budget, it gradually earned a 100 times more than what my father invested in the project. Unfortunately, my father wasn’t around to savour its success.