Karan Johar gets rights to Madan Mohan’s classics for Bombay Talkies

Bombay Talkies, a movie celebrating 100 years of Indian cinema, will see directors Karan Johar, Dibakar Banerjee, Anurag Kashyap and Zoya Akhtar working together for the first time. The four directors will put...

Bombay Talkies, a movie celebrating 100 years of Indian cinema, will see directors Karan Johar, Dibakar Banerjee, Anurag Kashyap and Zoya Akhtar working together for the first time. The four directors will put together four short stories to make one, larger-than-life project. And for Karan’s part, we’re told, that the director has got the rights to four recorded classics composed by the late Madan Mohan.

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A source close to the filmmaker reveals, “Last time, the late Yash Chopra had acquired the rights to the unrecorded songs by Madan Mohan for his film, Veer-Zaara (2004). And now, Karan has done the same and has got the rights to four hit classics by the late composer. The best part is that he got them free of cost.” When asked why such an exception was made, the source says, “Karan wanted rights to four songs, one of which is ‘Ajeeb dastaan hain yeh’ (which is also the title of Karan’s part of the story in Bombay Talkies) from the film Dil Apna Aur Preet Parai, 1960. Saregama HMV, the label that owns the rights to the songs, gave them to Karan for free because the movie celebrates 100 years of cinema. It was a sweet gesture.”