When Arpita Chakraborty received a call to croon the recreated version of Paisa Yeh Paisa from Total Dhamaal, the singer neither had an idea which movie it was for, nor the slightest clue that she would be the voice of none other than Madhuri Dixit-Nene. “When I heard that Madhuri, who is the epitome of grace, beauty and poise, will be a part of the song, mera dil bhi dhak dhak karne laga,” she laughs. When composers Gourov and Roshin informed her of the same, Arpita felt that she now had a double responsibility on her shoulders. “Firstly, I had to do justice to the iconic song and secondly, because Madhuri was to be a part of it!” she said. The reactions have been positive. “There is no way that we can even touch the original number, but this was our way of paying it a tribute,” she says.
With her mother being a Hindustani classical exponent, Arpita was introduced to the world of music from a young age, and performed on stage for the first time at the age of five. The design graduate, who moved to Mumbai eight years ago from Orissa, started off as a dubbing artiste. She moved on to singing jingles and her playback break came with Raske Bhare Tore Naina from Satyagraha (2014). The singer has also lent her voice to songs from Hero and Ragini MMS 2 and crooned in as many as 15 languages, including Oriya, Telugu, Tamil, Kannada and Punjabi among others.
With Paisa Yeh Paisa being the biggest song of her career so far, Arpita hopes that Bollywood will sit up and take notice. They already have, as the artiste reveals that she has started getting offers. “I’m being selective now. From now on, the graph has to go higher,” shares Arpita, who is also working on a couple of singles.
