| Bio: | Kamala Jharia's real name was Kamala Singha. She lived in the palace of the Maharaja of Jharia (now in Dhanbad district, coal capital of India, Jharkhand state, India). Her parents probably worked in the palace in some capacity. The surname Singha is common in several Hindi speaking northern and north western states of India as also in Bengal but there is no doubt that she was a Bengalee by birth. Mr K. Mallick (real name was Qamal Malik) who at the time was a very popular gramophone singer, was invited to the palace to sing at the court of Maharaja Shiva Prasad on the occasion of his marriage. The Maharaja was so pleased with K. Mallick's performance that he appointed him court singer in Jharia. K Mallick had to stay back at Jharia for sometime during which he discovered Kamala's musical talent and brought her to Calcutta and introduced her to HMV authorities. Kamala recorded four songs for HMV and went back to Jharia. She was paid sixty five Rupees only for the four songs. Her first published record was a red label one, numbered N 3137 in 1930. The songs were a) Priya Jeno Prem Bhulo Na, a Ghazal and b) Nithur Nayan Baan Keno Hano, a Dadra. Lyricist for both the songs was _Dhiren Das_. The authorities had some problem in naming the artiste. They knew her name but not her surname. They could not credit her as Miss Kamala because there was already one singer of the same name. Finally it was decided to identify her as Miss Kamala (Jharia) keeping in mind her then usual place of residence and thus began her illustrious musical career. Her formal training in music was from giants like a) Ujir Khan for Thumris, Ghazals and Indian classical b) Jamiruddin Khan c) K. Mallick d) Mr Satish Ghosh and Shrinath Das Nandi, to whom she formally performed the Nara Bandhan and became a regular student. Later, she came in contact with Kaji Nazrul Islam and Tulsi Lahiri, who was a film director, producer, lyricist and music director in fact he was a very colorful personality with |
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