This special compilation of Hindi film songs will be gifted to Pakistani diplomats during Mukherjee's tour to promote one of India's biggest strongest manifestations of soft power, Bollywood.
The Public Diplomacy Division of the Ministry of External Affairs has tied up with the RPG group's Saregama India Ltd (formerly The Gramophone Company of India Ltd) to bring out this special product as a gesture of diplomatic goodwill for a country in which Hindi film songs are all the rage.
This 60-song CD pack drawn from Saregama's vast archives covers songs from 1946 to 2006 and is not available in the domestic market. It will be given to various foreign ministry officials when Indian delegations visit a country.
The CD, which will have 1940s' film songs, will remind Pakistanis of undivided India and the undivided talent in the Bombay film industry. The first song is Jab dil hi toot gaya by Kundan Lal Sehgal from the film Shahjahan. The album signs off with the title track of Kabhi alvida na kehna by Sonu Nigam.
While gifting indigenous products of fame to foreign dignitaries has always been part of diplomatic courtesy, the history of gifting Hindi film music to Pakistan is interesting. Bollywood films and its byproducts were banned in Pakistan for many years, depriving Hindi films of a good market.
Bollywood lost millions of dollars in revenue while pirated products sold freely on the streets in Lahore and Karachi. Things have changed over the past few months, things have changed as the Parvez Musharraf administration allowed the release of some Bollywood films.
As films like Taare Zameen Par and Bhoothnath hit Pak theatres, 'Lollywood' (as they call the Lahore film industry) also came forward, making Khuda ke liye with Indian stars like Nasiruddin Shah. In short, Hindi films in Pakistan had never seen better days.
During Partition, the "nightingale" of Hindi film music