Bollywood is full of stories of how Lataji ring-fenced her position till the very end, often raising the hackles of her female peers, although male singers, such as Mohammed Rafi, Mukesh, Kishore Kumar, Mahendra Kapoor and Manna Dey (all deceased) and others, chose to maintain a professional rapport with her.
Though anticipated, when it became official that the Melody Queen of India, Lata Mangeshkar, is no longer among us, it hit the collective consciousness of the nation like a sledgehammer.The only consolation was that she may have passed on, but .