Tributes to Krishna Kalle, an accomplished playback singer in Hindi and Marathi film industry, on her 78th birth anniversary today.

Krishna Kalle was a known name in the Hindi and Marathi film music world. In the era of Lata Mangeshkar, she, along with Suman Kalyanpur, Mubarak Begam , Kamal Barot and Sharda tried hard to be in the limelight.

Krishna Kalle is synonymous with few hit songs of 60s and early 70s. “Meri Hasraton Ki Duniya”, her duet with Mohammred Rafi in a film called ‘Gaal Gulabi Nain Sharabi’ (1974) and “Hume To Maar Diya”, a duet with Mahendra Kapoor from the film ” Hum Kahan Ja Rahe Hain ” (1966) are still fresh in memory of the connoisseurs of old Hindi film songs. Other famous films of that era, which have her memorable songs, are : Hum Kahan Ja Rahe Hain (1966), Bambai Raat Ki Bahon Mein (1967), Raaz (1967), Naunihal (1967), Shikar (1968), Sati Sulochana (1969) and Gaal Gulabi Nain Sharabi (1974).

She was born in Karwar. As her father were serving at Kanpur, she completed her schooling from there . She got the sanskar of Hindi and Urdu over there. At the age of 16, she started singing at Kanpur Radio Station. She sung in various Yatra singeet mahotsav in Uttar Pradesh and got popularity. In 1957, she was honoured with national level youth singing awards by India’s first president Rajendra Prasad and first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru. The following year, she bagged the All India Sugam Sangeet Award first prize , K L Sehgal Memorial’s Golden Voice Award and many others. And after this she got a job with All India Radio in 1960.

Arun Date first heard her voice, when she visited Mumbai. He introduced her to music director Yashwant Dev. This started her journey as Marathi singer.

She was active in the Hindi film industry for about a decade from 1960s to the 1970s. She sang over 200 Hindi film songs, 100 Marathi film songs, 100 bhajans, ghazals and devotional songs. She also released non-film albums with famous singers like Manna Dey and Mohammed Rafi.

Krishna Kalle passed away on March 15, 2015 at the age of 74 in Mumbai.