Anup Jalota: Lesser known facts about the bhajan samrat

The bhajan samrat Anup Jalota is popular for his contribution in the field of music both as a vocalist and musician. Some of his popular bhajans include ‘Aisi Lagi Lagan’, ‘Main Nahi Makhan Khayo’, ‘Rang De Chunariya’ and many more. But do you know besides singing, Anup Jalota also worked as a television presenter for a short span of time? There are many more facts like this about the famous bhajan singer Anup Jalota that are not known by all. Scroll down to have a look:

The rumors of Anup Jalota in an alleged relationship with his 28-year-old student Jasleen Matharu has been creating a lot buzz of late. However, if you think this is the first time Anup is witnessing a whirl in his love life, then you are wrong. Before Jasleen Mathura, Anup Jalota was married thrice.

The name of his first wife is Sonali Sheth. She was a Gujarati girl, who never got approved by Anup’s family. On the professional ground they became one of the best jodies. However, even that didn’t last for long, and they parted way. Sonali then got married to Roop Kumar Rathod. Since his love marriage didn’t turn the way he expected, for his second chance he opted for the old school arrangement and married Bina Bhatia. However, the cupid couldn’t hit this time as well, and the two got divorced. Anup Jalota then went ahead for the charm of the third time and married Medha Gujral. She was the niece of former Indian Prime Minister I.K. Gujral. Their relationship bloomed and they became parents to an adorable son Aryaman. Unfortunately, destiny played the dark card again and Medha passed away due to liver failure. In the picture above, twining in black is Medha Jalota with Anup Jalota.

Anup Jalota is not the first generation in his family to take up devotional and classical singing. His father Late Puroshottam Das Jalota was a renowned classical singer of his time. He was the first teacher Anup had in his learning days. The present-day bhajan samrat started his training from a very tender age of seven.

Those who know Anup Jalota can’t imagine him as anyone else but a classical singer giving spiritually sound songs to the music world. The only thing people can think of him playing is a harmonium. But during his college days, there was something besides music that kept him in talks. Anup Jalota was into cricket his college days and was counted among the good batsmen back then.

When initially in Mumbai, Anup Jalota was also treated like any other struggling artist. However, things took a different turn when he got his first job as a chorus singer at a national radio station. A team of guitarist, violinist, santoor, dholak, sarod, sarangi, sitar and tabla player used to back him usually. This is how his journey into the world of music began.

Anup Jalota recorded a number of songs that did well in the market. Yet, the breakthrough the artist was looking appeared as a distant dream. It was ‘Shirdi Ke Sai Baba’ that helped him gain recognition. Manoj Kumar recorded four songs with Anup for the movie and they became a big hit. This success brought Anup the fame he was waiting for.

Anup Jalota has given some of the best Indian classical melodies to the music world. He got due recognition for the same in 2012. He was honored with the Padma Shri by the Government of India in the field of Art-Indian Classical Music-Vocals.