Usha Khanna

Usha Khanna (Hindi: उषा खन्ना; born 7 October 1941) is an Indian music director in Hindi cinema. She is the third female music director to enter the Indian film industry, after Jaddan Bai and Saraswati Devi and is one of the most commercially successful music directors in the male dominated music industry. She is most known for songs like "Chodo kal ki baatein", "Shaayad meri shaadi ka khayal", "Zindagi pyaar ka geet hai" and "Aap to aise na the". She remained active for more than 3 decades from 1960s to 1980s. She is still active making some music for some movies and television-serials, more than 40 years after her debut as music director in Dil Deke Dekho (1959). She received a Filmfare Award nomination for composing the songs for the huge hit film Souten (1983). She was married to director, producer, lyricist, Sawan Kumar Tak, from whom she separated later on.

Born in Gwalior, her father, Manohar Khanna, was a lyricist and singer, working as Assistant Superintendent in the Water Works Department in then Gwalior State. When he came to Bombay (now Mumbai) for some work in 1946 he met Jaddanbai who was mother of Hindi film actress Nargis Dutt.On her request he started writing Gazals for Hindi films by the name, Jaaved Anwar .He was getting a monthly salary of Rs. 250 in Gwalior State and Jaddanabi offered him Rs. 800 for 3 gazals which he wrote for Jaddanbai,s Nargis Art Productions film Romeo Juliet . Usha Khanna did often take inspiration from Arabic music, which she liked and she claims that she has never lifted any song directly, but that she has composed something along the lines.

The popular music director O. P. Nayyar introduced Usha Khanna to Sashadhar Mukherjee, a powerful man in the Indian film industry at that time. She sang a song for Mukherjee, and when he realised that she had composed the song on her own, he told her to compose two songs per day for one year. After a few months, Mukherjee signed her as the composer for his movie Dil Deke Dekho (1959) as a music composer. The film, which also introduced the actress Asha Parekh, became a big hit, and Mukherjee hired her again for another Asha Parekh starrer Hum Hindustani (1961).

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