Lata Mangeshkar, fondly remembered as the Nightingale of India, touched countless lives with her voice. Over the course of her extraordinary career, she recorded nearly 50,000 songs in 14 different languages, earning titles such as Queen of Melody and Voice of the Millennium. Her contribution to music was recognised with the nation’s highest honours, including the Dadasaheb Phalke Award in 1989 and the Bharat Ratna in 2001. In 2009, she was also conferred France’s prestigious National Order of the Legion of Honour. It was the late singer’s birthday on September 28. On the occasion, as we cherish her legacy, here’s also recalling her personal life and why she chose to never get married. Despite living a life in the public eye, Lata Mangeshkar kept her personal life deeply private. She never married, choosing instead to dedicate herself to her music and the responsibilities that came with it. Reflecting on this decision, she once shared, “People ask why I never married. To that I say that God gave me a job to do and I’m very satisfied with my work. Yes, like everyone else, I do have my moments of sorrow. But my sorrow is very temporary. What I cannot bear is to see other people suffering. I feel a sense of joy by helping such people.” Her outlook was rooted in faith and destiny. She often expressed the belief that while no one can escape fate, good thoughts and good deeds can soften its impact. She explained it through the example of Lord Ram, saying, “One cannot escape one’s destiny, but by thinking good thoughts, helping others and doing good deeds, I feel we can lessen a sorrowful fate upto a point. Ram, we believe, is Vishnu’s avatar. Despite being a king’s son, he had to endure an exile for fourteen years. That was his destiny. But because he did good deeds during this period, killing Ravan being one of them, he saw good times again and succeeded in creating ‘Ramrajya’.”Yet, few know that the legendary singer did find love once. In the 1960s, she shared a close bond with Raj Singh Dungarpur, the youngest son of Maharawal Lakshman Singhji, the ruler of the princely state of Dungarpur in Rajasthan. Born in 1935, Raj Singh was a passionate cricketer who went on to play for Rajasthan in the Ranji Trophy and for Central Zone in the Duleep Trophy between 1955 and 1971. Although he came to Mumbai to study law at the age of 24, cricket remained his first love. It was here that he became friends with Lata’s brother, Hridaynath Mangeshkar, and often joined him for cricket matches—circumstances that brought him closer to Lata.However, when Raj Singh’s father came to know of their relationship, he strongly opposed it. His objections stemmed from the fact that Lata was not from a royal family, belonged to a different community, and was six years older than Raj. Under immense family pressure, marriage between the two was never possible.Lata herself never publicly spoke about their relationship. When asked if Raj Singh was her “one true love,” she told Hindustan Times, “There are some things only for the heart to know. Let me keep it that way.” Raj Singh, however, did open up years later. In a 2004 interview with Mid-Day, he admitted that family expectations and their very different backgrounds in the 1960s stood in the way of marriage. Still, he cherished what they shared, saying it neither grew nor diminished with time. He lovingly described Lata as the “treasure house of my admiration and affection.” Go to Source
