Thakur was born 1897 in a Jahaj village [REF] in the Princely State of Baroda (5 km from Khambhat in present-day Anand District, Gujarat [REF]), into a poor military family.
Impressed by his singing Thakur and his younger brother Ramesh Chandra were sponsored by a wealthy Parsi philanthropist Shahpurji Mancherji Dungaji in circa 1909 to train in Hindustani classical music in the Gandharva Mahavidyalaya, a music school in Bombay, under classical singer Vishnu Digambar Paluskar [REF].