تیرے بنا زندگی سے کوئی شکوہ تو نہیں Tere Bina Zindagi Se Koi Shikwa To Nahin — No Complaint Against Life Without You

Gulzar

1934– living

Geet

Someone has been separated from the person they love, and has been keeping the peace about it. Life without you, he says, I have no complaint against it. Then the song lets the sentence finish, and the whole thing turns: life without you is still life, only it is not life. The complaint he swore he did not have arrives anyway, in the second half of the same breath.

Gulzar wrote it for Aandhi in 1975, R.D. Burman set it, and Lata Mangeshkar and Kishore Kumar sang it as the argument of a couple who had divorced and were trying again. Three passages ahead, and the last one contains the most quoted lines in the whole film.

01 — tere bina zindagi se koi shikwa to nahin

تیرے بنا زندگی سے کوئی شکوہ تو نہیں
شکوہ نہیں شکوہ نہیں شکوہ نہیں
تیرے بنا زندگی بھی لیکن زندگی تو نہیں
زندگی نہیں زندگی نہیں زندگی نہیں

तेरे बिना ज़िंदगी से कोई शिकवा तो नहीं
शिकवा नहीं शिकवा नहीं शिकवा नहीं
तेरे बिना ज़िंदगी भी लेकिन ज़िंदगी तो नहीं
ज़िंदगी नहीं ज़िंदगी नहीं ज़िंदगी नहीं

tere bina zindagi se koi shikwa to nahin
shikwa nahin shikwa nahin shikwa nahin
tere bina zindagi bhi lekin zindagi to nahin
zindagi nahin zindagi nahin zindagi nahin

Against life without you, no complaint at all. No complaint, no complaint, no complaint. But life without you, well, it is life. Only it is not life. Not life, not life, not life.

The paradox is the song, and it is planted in the first line so that the second line of the sentence detonates it. The triple repetition is not decoration: shikwa nahin three times is a man overproving his point, and the second triple, zindagi nahin, is the same man losing the argument with himself. The song is a denial that keeps score.

شکوہ shikwa: a complaint, a grievance

02 — jee mein aata hai tere daman mein

جی میں آتا ہے تیرے دامن میں
سر چھپا کے ہم روتے رہے
تیری بھی آنکھوں میں آنسوؤں کی نمی تو نہیں
تیرے بنا زندگی سے کوئی شکوہ تو نہیں

जी में आता है तेरे दामन में
सर छुपा के हम रोते रहे
तेरी भी आँखों में आँसुओं की नमी तो नहीं
तेरे बिना ज़िंदगी से कोई शिकवा तो नहीं

jee mein aata hai tere daman mein
sar chhupake ham rote rahe
teri bhi aankhon mein aansuon ki nami to nahin
tere bina zindagi se koi shikwa to nahin

What I feel like doing is hiding my head in the fold of your garment and going on crying. And your eyes too, there was no wetness of tears in them. Against life without you, no complaint at all.

The whole passage is a confession disguised as a wish. Daman is the garment's edge, the fold a child hides its face in, and he wants to cry there, which tells you exactly what the separation has reduced him to. The second half is colder and it is where the real evidence lies: he watched her eyes, and they stayed dry, and he reports the fact with the same flatness he uses for everything else. The refrain after it is now a man insisting in front of a witness.

دامن daman: the edge or fold of a garment; the place a child hides its face
نمی nami: moisture, wetness

03 — tum jo kah do to aaj ki raat

تم جو کہہ دو تو آج کی رات
چاند ڈوبے گا نہیں رات کو روک لو
رات کی بات ہے اور زندگی باقی تو نہیں
تیرے بنا زندگی سے کوئی شکوہ تو نہیں

तुम जो कह दो तो आज की रात
चाँद डूबेगा नहीं रात को रोक लो
रात की बात है और ज़िंदगी बाक़ी तो नहीं
तेरे बिना ज़िंदगी से कोई शिकवा तो नहीं

tum jo kah do to aaj ki raat
chand doobega nahin raat ko rok lo
raat ki baat hai aur zindagi baaki to nahin
tere bina zindagi se koi shikwa to nahin

If you were to say the word, this very night the moon would not set. Hold back the night. It is only a matter of one night, and there is not much life left over. Against life without you, no complaint at all.

The famous passage, and the cruelty is in the ordering. First the impossible promise, all power and flattery: the moon will not set if you ask it to. Then the sentence that shrinks him: it is only a night, and the life is running out. Raat ki baat hai dismisses the miracle he just offered, and zindagi baaki to nahin is the first honest sentence in the song. Everything after it is the refrain of a man who has stopped convincing anyone, including himself.

ڈوبنا doobna: to set, to sink
باقی baaki: remaining, left over

Reading it whole

The song is built on a sentence that contradicts itself, and the whole art of it is that you do not notice until it has finished. Tere bina zindagi se koi shikwa to nahin: against life without you, no complaint. The song then repeats the phrase three times, like a man swearing in front of a magistrate. And the second half of the line is where the truth was hiding all along: tere bina zindagi bhi lekin zindagi to nahin. Life without you, yes, but it is not life. The denial is complete and the complaint is total, and they are the same sentence.

The middle passage is the one nobody remembers and the one that explains everything. He wants to hide his head in the fold of her garment and cry. Tere daman mein sar chhupake hum rote rahe. It is what a child does, and the song is not ashamed of it. And then the second half of the passage: your eyes too, they had no wetness in them, aansuon ki nami to nahin. He noticed. He noticed that she did not cry, and he is not complaining, he is just reporting it, and the reporting is the complaint.

The last passage is the reason the song outlived the film. If you were to say the word, this very night the moon would not set, hold back the night. It is the largest promise the language has: not I will stop time, but time will stop if you ask it. And the line that follows breaks your heart with arithmetic. Raat ki baat hai aur zindagi baaki to nahin. It is only a matter of one night, and there is not much life left over. The man who could hold back the night cannot hold back the rest of his years.

Aandhi was banned during the Emergency for reasons that had nothing to do with the song, and the ban gave the film a fame the film had not asked for. Kishore sings the plea and Lata carries the other half of the duet, and the recording people mean is the one from the film.

Recordings

Lata Mangeshkar and Kishore Kumar

The duet from Aandhi (1975), composed by R.D. Burman.

Text and rights

Devanagari text supplied and checked by a reader who knows the language. The Urdu script and the transliteration follow that reading.

From the 1975 film Aandhi, composed by R.D. Burman. The refrain returns between passages in the recording, more often than it is printed here.

Gulzar is alive and writing, so this song is still in copyright. It is quoted here as the subject of Harf's own criticism: the translation, the reading of each passage and the essay around them are original work written for this page. If you hold the rights and would like something changed, tell us on Instagram.