Neela Akash

Delhi 1962. An alcoholic brings his family to the brink of disaster, only to be saved by his daughter who graduated with a Bachelor's degree.

Neela means blue and Akash means sky. The movie title is aptly chosen, and so are the names of the two lead actors. Neela (Mala Sinha) and Dharmendra become work colleagues and fall in love. As a wealthy, handsome and well spoken man many women have designs on him, none more so than Rita and her mother.

The film begins with Akash and his sidekick Madan Lal driving in a targa (open top) Standard Herald and a ball lands in the car. Akash and Neela have a rhetorical conversation,laced with irony about return of the ball. Little do they know then that their lives will intertwine, and they will sing together to the tunes of Scottish bagpipes.

Madan Lal (Mehmood) provides some comic relief through his amorous interludes. His oft repeated dialogue "one button-hole, one button. One heart, one woman" is put to the test when three women buttonhole him as he emerges from a shower.

Shot mostly in Delhi, the picturesque Lodhi Gardens forms a scenic backdrop for romantic interludes, while the specter of Chinese aggression looms in the background.When Akash receives his call-up, he is ready, and ready to give up his life to fulfil his mission of delivering documents. In a fit of pique, he throws away the safety talisman given him by Neela, but lives to see the value of love.

From a social perspective, the values that Akash and his mother espouse, such as "sins of the father shall not be held against the daughter" are pioneering for the time. Very few families allowed their daughters to work in those days. Neela went to work because of the failure of her father; but her road was not easy.

The acting is superb, the plot is rather intense, songs are forgettable, though the lyrics are appropriate to the sequence context.

A great movie to watch to see Connaught Place as it was in the sixties, Race Course, Lodhi Gardens etc.,

In certain Bollywood movies, we find that their titles are nothing but the names of the heroes and the heroines of these movies but they give a wrong impression about their themes. I strongly oppose such practice of keeping titles of the movies because it's a kind of cheating with the audience. One such movie is Neela Aakaash (1965).

As appears from the title of Neela Aakaash, it must be related to the sky because Neela means blue and Aakaash means sky, therefore, the literal meaning of Neela Aakaash is blue sky. But actually the title of the movie is nothing but the screen names of the heroine and the hero. Neela is the name of the heroine whereas Aakaash is the name of the hero. Well, fortunately, despite the story being a routine love story cum social drama, sky has a little bit of role here. The hero is a pilot whereas the heroine is an air hostess.

Neela Aakaash is the love story of Aakaash (Dharmendra), a suitable boy from a rich family who is a pilot by profession and Neela (Maala Sinha), a girl from a financially weak family who has to take a job after becoming a graduate because of her alcoholic and gambler father (Raj Mehra) who loses his job also due to embezzling the funds of his employer company. To make both ends meet for her mother (Sulochana) and her younger sister and brother, Neela becomes an air-hostess and starts working for the Indian Airlines. She falls in love with Aakaash who is a pilot and her colleague and their love life is all set to reach its destination in the form of marriage because Aakash's mother (Mumtaaz Begum) fixes the matrimonial alliance by meeting Neela's parents when the trouble strikes for them.

Aakash's ex-landlady (Manorama) and her daughter (Shashikala) collude with Neela's unscrupulous father who is already unhappy with the prospective marriage of his daughter (because her earning is the only source of income for the family and quite naturally, money for his comforts) and create misunderstanding in Neela's heart for Aakaash. They do so because the daughter of his ex-landlady wants to marry Aakash. Now misunderstanding Aakash and forming a poor opinion about his character, Neela breaks up with him. Her misunderstanding is cleared by Aakash's friend and colleague (Mehmood) but only when Aakash is sent on a dangerous military mission by the government. He gets injured while fighting with the enemies of the nation. However the lovers unite in the end and Neela's father repents for whatever he has done.

The drama of the break up of Neela and Aakash appears during the final 20 minutes of the movie and prior to that the director has done nothing but filled the time duration through comedy, romance, songs and some family scenes. No attention has been paid to the stoutness of the script which has several weaknesses and plot-holes. I could not understand till the end as to whether the hero works for the Indian Airlines or for the Indian Air Force. When he is carrying the regular passenger flights, how his office asks him to move on a military mission, is beyond my comprehension. Perhaps the director has done it to cash on the patriotic sentiments flourishing in Indian hearts during the sixties because we had to fight three wars within a single decade in that period. However this attempt of his is quite childish. He had to separate the love-birds under any excuse and then had to reunite them after a little bit of drama, that's all. Further, it is ridiculous that the hero is called the captain of the flight by the air-hostess whereas he is shown to fly the plane himself. I doubt that the pilot of the plane and the captain of the flight can be one and the same person. Well, who cares ? At least not the filmmaker.

Still this movie can be given a watch because of the melodious songs composed by Madan Mohan with the help of the touching and beautiful lyrics of Raja Mehndi Ali Khan. Tere Paas Aake Mera Waqt Guzar Jaata Hai, Aakhiri Geet Mohabbat Ka Suna Loon To Chaloon, Aapko Pyar Chhupane Ki Buri Aadat Hai etc. are unforgettable songs.

Dharmendra has risen above the weaknesses of the character and the script and delivered a performance which is touching in serious scenes and amusing in comic and romantic scenes. His pair with very beautiful Maala Sinha is lovable. Maala has also done well. Mehmood alongwith Maadhavi has done very good comedy and generated enough laughs for the audience.

At the cost of repetition, I assert that Neela Aakaash is true to its name only to the extent that the hero and the heroine have to fly in the plane according to the need of their employment in the movie. Else it has no link with the blue sky. The movie is entertaining all the same and recommended as a decent one time watch.