Celebrating the Lata Mangeshkar Birth Anniversary: How Many Songs Did The 'Queen of Melody' Sing?

Today, i.e. 28 September, is the birthday of 'Swar Kokila' Bharat Ratna Lata Mangeshkar. Lata Mangeshkar, the evergreen great singer of Indian music, was born on this day in 1929. She has sung songs in about 36 languages including Marathi, Hindi, Gujarati, Bengali, Assamese etc. There has been a discussion from time to time about how many songs she has sung. Let us see what information is available about how many songs she has sung in total.

In her singing career of more than 7 decades, Lata Didi has sung thousands of songs. Her name is also recorded in the Guinness Book of World Records.

Lata Mangeshkar Started singing career in 1942

Lata Mangeshkar started her singing career in 1942 at just 13. She sang the song 'Naachu Ya Gade, Khelo Saari Mani Haus Bhaari' written by Sadashivrao Nevrekar for Vasant Joglekar's Marathi film 'Kiti Hasaal' (1942), but this song was removed from the final cut of the film. The song was removed from the final cut. In the Marathi film 'Pahili Mangala-Gaur' (1942), Lata Mangeshkar not only acted but also sang her first song 'Natali Chaitraachi Navalaai'. She also sang her first Hindi song 'Mata Ek Sapoot Ki Duniya Badal De Tu' in the Marathi film 'Gajbhau' (1943).

Her name was recorded in the Guinness Book

In her long career, Lata Mangeshkar gave thousands of superhit songs like 'Ajeeb Dastaan Hai Ye', 'Jab Pyar Kiya To Darna Kya', 'Neela Aasman So Gaya' and 'Rahe Na Rahe Hum'. In 1974, her name was registered in the Guinness Book of Records. Lata Mangeshkar's name is recorded as the artist who has recorded the most number of songs in history.

Sang 25 thousand songs from 1948-1974

According to the Guinness Book of World Records organization, Lata Mangeshkar has sung 25,000 singles, duets and group songs in 20 Indian languages from 1948 to 1974. However, then Mohammad Rafi objected to this claim and said that he had recorded more songs than Lata Mangeshkar.

Sang a total of 30 thousand songs till 1987

After this, in 1991, the Guinness Book of World Records once again included Lata Mangeshkar's name as the artist who has recorded the most number of songs in the world. It was then said that from 1948 to 1987, Lata had recorded 30,000 singles, duets and group songs in twenty Indian languages. However, the Guinness Book of Records removed it in 1991 without giving any explanation.

What Did Lata Mangeshkar say about this calculation?

Lata Ji herself did not know the number of songs she had sung or recorded. She never cared about it. There are many of her songs which were recorded but were never released. Lata Mangeshkar said in an interview with 'PTI-Bhasha' in the year 2021 that she does not have any record of her unreleased songs.

Lata had said, “Recently I heard one of my songs which was not released. What happens is that sometimes there are too many songs in a film and it stops the flow of the film, so they remove the song and try to put it in another film. But if it does not fit, it remains in cold storage and people forget about it with time. But it is not possible for me to count them, it should be done by someone else.”