SEE

’Dekho dekho dekho Baaiskop dekho

Dilli kaa kutub Minaar dekho
Bambai sahar ki Bahaar dekho

Ye aagare kaa Hai taajamahal
Ghar baithe sara Sasaar dekho

Paisaa pheko Tamasha dekho’

The sweet melodious voice of Nayana floated in the air as she attracted the kids and adults to the roadshow.
Though the lyrics promised to show a very vibrant world she could not see.
She had lost her vision four years back.
They had left this incident with the understanding that it was the harsh will of God. 
Unknown to them it was a condition that was temporary and could be rectified by treatment.
Aged just 12 she accompanied her dad Appu in the day to day turmoil of survival. Having lost her mother to an unknown disease when she was a baby it was one among a long list of tragedies and downturns in their life. 
Her dad singly and tenderly cared for her and brought her up. 
He was her eyes and vision.

A nomad with no roots tied down, Appu had landed in ’Mayanagri’ Bombay when Nayana (after losing her eyesight) was 8 years old.
Living on the roadside tents they called home, life continued for them without any progress in their lifestyle.
Working as a short term, day to day earning labourer, helped him light the ’chulah’ for their meals.
Small scrap wood lit between stones and bricks made up their mobile kitchen range.
Roti (flatbread) made of wheat or millet grain flour cooked on a hot iron tawa (skillet) balanced on these bricks and stones was their daily bread.
This was normally accompanied by a hand crushed onion and a few green chillies and ’lotas’ (jugs) of water gulped down with the intent of softening the hard chewy bread, killing the heat produced by the chilli and at the same time bloating up their tummies to reach a level of satiation. 
This was a common trick used by the very poor in their battle against hunger.
On luckier days a watery dal (boiled lentil gruel) was a bonus.
Trying his hand at various roadside trades, his latest venture was operating of a mobile ’bioscope’
It was a colourfully decorated box with three circular holes.
It was a looking glass into unknown cities having snapshots of beauty and marvels of India.
The bioscope gave audiences a ticket to another world with the bioscopewala being the one to transport you temporarily to these lands. Appu regretted that his daughter could not see the beauty of these lands.
A hand-operated rotor was turned to flick the images and accompanying songs or interesting commentary was used to connect the visual images to the viewer.

Over the years Appu had discovered that Nayana sang well so he had scripted or copied pieces that she could sing along as he operated the show. 
His latest song was a straight lift off from a Rajesh Khanna Bollywood movie -- Dushman. 
This movie was about 6 years old but the song ’dekho dekho dekho...’ was still popular among the masses as it was pictured on the heartthrob Mumtaz as she entertained on the silver screen.
Apt for their act, father and daughter put their heart and soul into fine-tuning this number as they realised it could be a crowd puller.
Children and adults thronged to view the short show and Nayanas voice lent that extra touch. Also, the sight of a blind young girl singing touched the hearts of the masses. She was a crowd puller.
Appu and Nayana travelled during the day going into new areas to display their show.
Middle-class family kids tugged at their parents to let them have a glimpse of this world. 
Along with kids, middle-aged and toothless old men and women also enjoyed the shows.
As father and daughter were kind-hearted they accommodated as and when they could and gave free shows to the poor kids that could not afford to pay.
So that they could gain a new audience the duo travelled further every day going into new areas of Bombay.
That is how, one afternoon they landed in Pydhonie, a neighbourhood of South Bombay.

                               -------//------

A few weeks earlier the movie Amar Akbar Anthony had released.
Appu had not seen the movie himself but heard of the scene where Akbar (Rishi Kapoor) is singing a qawwali in a Shirdi Sai Baba temple.
His blind mother Bharati (Nirupa Roy) is being pursued by crooks and guided by the golden voice in the song seeks refuge in the temple. As her blind eyes look in the direction of the statue miraculously two spheres of light from the eyes of the Baba land on her eyes and --miracle of miracles! --- she gets back her eyesight. 

Appu  kept praying that a similar miracle should happen in his daughters life.

As mentioned earlier, father and daughter travelling afar are one afternoon performing their roadshow in Pydhonie.
Unknown to them, a few yards away is a roadside Shirdi Sai Baba temple.

                           -------//------

Jamunadas was a renown film producer, director.
He had given Bollywood many hit movies which were money rakers at the box office.
All his movies had great masala stories and music.
His plus point was that as a talent hunter he had given many breaks to actors and singers who then had gone on to establish themselves.
His wife birthday was approaching and he had planned a surprise party.
To appease her he was visiting his jeweller's showroom in Pydhonie this afternoon. He would purchase a diamond necklace she liked and present it to her as a surprise on her birthday.
As he drove his Black Ambassador through the streets he noticed a crowd around a bioscopewala on one of the footpaths. A circle of kids along with some adults stood around all enthusiastically waiting for their turn to view the show.
A middle-aged poorly but cleanly dressed man stood operating the machine as his young daughter again poor but neatly dressed stood gesticulating and singing.
The lyrics ’Dekho dekho dekho Baaiskop dekho
Dilli kaa kutub Minaar dekho....’ floated melodiously in the air.

Her voice was beautiful and he was immediately attracted to it. 
Windscreen down with the cigarette smoke blown out of the cruising car he slowed down around the bend to get a better audio byte from this young singer.
She was sounding very good and would fit the voice of a child singer he needed for his next movie which he knew would be a blockbuster. 
He had to introduce this girl to his music director and with the right guidance, he knew they could create magic with her voice.
He decided that he would approach them on his way back from the jeweller.
He was in a jovial mood as he completed the transaction and was promised that the necklace would be delivered to his house in time for the birthday.
Whistling as he got into his car he started the ignition and cruised around the bend where he had seen the bioscope walla.
He could not hear the girls voice but in the background, Mohammed Rafi's voice crooned as the qawwali ’Shirdiwale Sai Baba.........’ reached his ears. 
Not seeing the street performers he sped to see if he could catch up with them.
He swerved into the next empty lane as he caught a glimpse of the father-daughter duo. The father had the wooden oblong bioscope balanced on a curl of cloth on his head and held the folding stand of the bioscope under his arm. His other outstretched hand held the hand of his young blind daughter as he led her along. 
What happened next surprised him as the bulky ambassador car shot out uncontrollable. He may have hit the accelerator instead of the brakes.
The climax of the song was blaring out from the speakers of the temple as at that moment the father and daughter decided to cross the road. 
Without looking into the road for traffic coming around the bend Appu stepped onto the tar road as the ambassador came shooting and hitting both father and daughter.
The bioscope flew from Appu’s head and came crashing down under the wheels of the car. A crunching sound could be heard as the wooden box crushed under the MRF tyres. 
Both father and daughter were flung across and landed flat on their backs on the pavement.
The car came to a screeching halt as Jamunadas got back control of the car and braked hard.
If you were a Bollywood masala movie fan, at this point you would expect two orbs of light to travel from the deity to Nayanas eyes.
No such miracle happened.

What happened was nothing short of another miracle. 
Both father and daughter though bleeding and badly injured survived the car crash. 
What took a hit was the bioscope which was destroyed.
People would never be able to see shows in it again.
Jamunadas took both injured father and daughter to the hospital and saw to it that they had the best treatment.
There was no serious life-threatening injury. 
They would recover.
On examination, his personal doctor, advised, ”Sethji, loss of Nayanas eyesight is temporary. It could be restored with treatment.”
Jamnadas replied, ”I will pay for this treatment. Don't leave any stone unturned. I want her vision to be restored at any cost”

Appu in the meantime got discharged and was given a job in Jamunadas’s household.

When he was told about Nayanas eye treatment his joys knew no bounds and he looked forward to the day his Nayana would get back her vision and could see.

Training on her singing started and simultaneously she was  being treated for her eyesight.
In a short time her eyesight was restored. 
It was a day of extreme joy for Appu.
She went on to record some brilliant songs which became superhits and were loved by the masses.
Now famous they travelled all around India and the world.

Appu accompanied her and this time he did not need the bioscope to see the beauty of the lands. 

He and his daughter could now see it through their own eyes.

Credit for images -- Internet.