Happy Birthday Lata Mangeshkar: Check out these interesting facts about the singer on her 91st birthday

It is Lata Mangeshkar’s 91st birth anniversary this year on September 28, i.e. this Monday. Popularly known as the Nightingale of India, Lata Mangeshkar is known to be the finest voices in the music industry across the world.

Born in Indore, Lata Mangeshkar’s name was ‘Hema’ during the time of her birth. Her parents changed her name after a female character ‘Latika’ from one of his father’s plays.

Not many people know that Lata Mangeshkar learnt her 1st music lesson when she was only 5.

It’s a little-known fact that Lata Mangeshkar had to leave her school on her very first day, as she took her younger sister, Asha, with her, too.

For music lovers, it will interest you to know that Lata Mangeshkar took lessons of Hindustani classic music from Ustad Aman Ali Khan of Bhindibazaar gharana.

Lata Mangeshkar was administered slow poison in 1962. She fell so sick that she was bedridden for 3 months, before she recovered completely.

Lata Mangeshkar had a feud with Mohammed Rafi in the 1960s over royalty payments given to singers then. She had sought support from Rafi, who outrightly rejected her idea. After singing a song for the movie Maya in 1961, the duo had decided to sing with each other for a brief time.

Of the many awards she received in her career, Lata Mangeshkar got her first National Award in 1973, for singing ‘Beeti Na Bitai’ from the film Parichay.

Lata Mangeshkar has had several awards against her name – Legion of Honour (2007), Bharat Ratna (2001), Padma Vibhushan (1999), Dadasaheb Phalke Award (1989), and Padma Bhushan (1969).

Not many people know that the Madhya Pradesh govt in 1984, and Maharashtra govt in 1992, instituted an award in the name of Lata Mangeshkar.

Lata Mangeshkar’s name featured in the Guinness Book of World Records for a brief time in the 1970s, for singing the most number of songs in different languages.

Lata loves her siblings very much. But Lata and her younger sister Asha Bhosle didn't speak for many years. Asha Bhosle married her personal secretary, the 31-year old Ganpatrao Bhosle in 1949, when she was barely 16!

Lata Mangeshkar’s first Hindi song was ‘Mata Ek Sapoot Ki Duniya’, which she sung for a Marathi movie Gajabhaau in 1943.

It was Ghulam Haider who Lata Mangeshkar her first major breakthrough. It was the song ‘Dil Mera Toda, Mujhe Kahin Nahi Chora’ from the movie Majboor in 1948. She once said “Ghulam Haider is truly my Godfather”.