As we are moving towards a five trillion dollar economy, our creator economy is bringing a new energy.
Hon. PM Narendra Modi Ji
Who is the most recorded music artist in the history of recorded music? Asha Bhosale Ji holds the Guiness World Record, having sung over 11,000 songs in more than 20 languages. And she just released her latest song and added one more to the total.
Asha Ji hails from a musical family. Her father, Pandit Dinanath Mangeshkar Ji was a stalwart of Indian classical music and her elder sister, the late Lata Ji, was one of the greatest and most influential artists of the Indian subcontinent. Asha Ji finishes the video with her granddaughter Zanai Bhosale, performing Indian classical dance to a Sitar solo piece.
In the video, Asha Ji also pays tribute to her fellow musicians and singers – among them Kishore Da, Rafi Sahab and her late husband, Pancham Da, who was a great musician himself. These genuis singers and musicians – those seen in the video as well as many others – created some of the best Hindi music in the last century. While majority of the songs they created were for movies, the quality of the songs was so high that they remain favourites of millions of Indians even after 60-70 years and have acquired a status independent of the movie they were made for 1. This can be easily seen if you listen to the All India Radio (AIR) where even in this fast paced world of streaming, people from all over India still request songs by Lata Ji, Asha Ji, Rafi Sahab, Kishore Da. Many of these songs often subtly indicate the zeitgeist in which they were made 2.
Meanwhile, the content creation landscape has changed drastically in the last two decades. YouTube is exploding with creations of young music artists who are now able to share their creations with the world without going through studios. While accomplished singers like Diljit Dosanjh and Grammy winner Ricky Kej have broken through to the international scene, much more content by hugely talented artists is being released on a daily basis.
We need to promote this amazing wave of talent that is producing content not just in music but in a wide variety of areas. And India is making great progress on this front under the visionary leadership of PM Narendra Modi Ji. Last year, for the first time, National Creators Awards were awarded to content creators producing content in a wide variety of areas ranging from education and food to social change and storytelling.
This year, India will hold the world’s first World Audio Visual & Entertainment Summit or WAVES 2025. As PM Modi Ji outlined in his monthly radio program Mann Ki Baat, WAVES 2025 will invite content creators, filmmakers, TV industry professionals, animation experts, gaming or entertainment technology innovators from all over the world to identify opportunities and brainstorm solutions.
As India gears up towards becoming the third largest economy in the world, it is also on its way to becoming one of leaders in the media and entertainment industry. WAVES 2025 summit will promote India as a top destination for content creation.
Indian Women Shine in Chess Once Again
In 2021, we thought we would get stronger chess players but here we have it a World Champion (Humpy) and a Bronze medallist (Vaishali).
GM Vishy Anand, five times World Chess Champion
Indian chess continues to do spectacularly. In 2024, India won Double Gold at the Olympics followed by GM D Gukesh becoming the youngest world chess champion in 138 year history of the game. And now GM Humpy Koneru, India’s top rated female chess player, has won the World Rapid 2024 Women Championship while GM R Vaishali won the Bronze in World Blitz Women Championship 2024.
GM Humpy Koneru secured two draws against reigning World Champion GM Wenjun Ju and World Rapid champion GM Kateryna Lagno before winning the final round and the title with a score 8.5/11. This is her second World Rapid title.
Somewhere inside, I had that determination to prove myself.
GM Humpy Koneru, World Rapid Women Champion
Few months back in the Chess Olympiad, GM R. Vaishali played maximum games with black in order to support her team. That was similar to opening the batting in cricket to wear off the new ball. In a spectacular performance, GM Vaishali clinched a bronze in the women’s section of the World Blitz Championship, defeating GM Zhu Jiner of China by 2.5-1.5 in the semi final.
GM Vaishali is a mentee of the Westbridge Anand Chess Academy (WACA) that has supported many young talented players over the years, including the current World Champion GM D Gukesh, GM Pragg, GM Nihal Sarin and GM Arjun Erigaisi, to name a few.
The progress of Indian chess continues to astonish the world. Looking at the way things are going, Indian chess fans may one day find themselves in a situation where both the world chess champion and his challenger are from India. Who do you cheer for?
It will be a bit like watching finals of the Indian Premier League (IPL). I was overjoyed when the Mumbai Indians (MI) lifted the tropy because MI is the home team. But I was also jubilant when the Chennai Super Kings (CSK) won because it was the team of Mahi Bhai. A win-win scenrio. 🙂
- A great way to witness this is in the YouTube comments below the song. Sometimes, a listener likes a sad song because that song was playing when she received some good news like exam results. At other times, a happy song may remind her of a late parent who loved that song. And they freely share these memories in public. YouTube comments are a treasure trove of new ideas for sociologists and fiction writers. ↩︎
- I grew up listening to All India Radio. Many distractions came along the way from cable TV to OTTs but I always found my way back. If I don’t listen to Lata Ji, Kishore Da or Rafi Sahab for a couple of days, I feel like something is missing. It’s like an essential vitamin that I need on a daily basis. I also love the fact that All India Radio has always been producing special programs for the Indian Army. Before the days of smartphones and fast connectivity, radio was the only connection with the civilian world that these brave soldiers had when they were guarding the country on remote borders in scorching heat or at sub-zero temperatures. ↩︎
Quote by PM Modi Ji is from the Mann Ki Baat program. Quote by GM Vishy Anand is from News 18 report. Quote by GM Humpy Koneru is from ChessBase India interview.
