Professionally and creatively the first turning point in my life came when I was just 12 years old. It happened when I met the musician Biddu in London, my hometown. He was looking for young Indian girls who could sing and he happened to meet my mother who told him that I could. When I met him, he was working on a song called Made in India. He heard my voice, liked it and gave me the opportunity to sing the background vocals for it. So at the age of 12, singing for somebody who went on to become my mentor was a huge milestone for me. Our association grew from there and I sang in each of his albums.

I was born and brought up in England and was an absolute geek in school. But my interest in singing took off around then. My mother has a beautiful voice and being around her inspired me. I was singing by the time I was four or five years old and later was considered to be one of the best singers in the school choir.

When I was 17, I got together with two other British Asian girls to launch an all-girl band called Sansara. We struck a deal with Universal Music India and brought out two songs — Yeh Dil Sun Raha Hai and Habibi. The songs did really well but our group split up and I went on to complete my education. After I graduated from the London School of Economics, Biddu advised me to move to India if I was serious about making singing my career. That was probably the biggest turning point in my life. For, moving to India just to test the waters was a risky decision.

I came to Mumbai around 2002-2003 and within a year I became an MTV veejay and also released a remix song called Mera Babu Chhail Chhabeela. This was a huge hit and a significant point in  my career. A year later my second remix Ek Pardesi Mera Dil Le Gaya became an even bigger hit. This opened the doors of Bollywood for me and in 2005 I made my debut in films with director David Dhawan’s Shaadi No 1. So these years were instrumental in bringing me to India and giving me the opportunity to pursue a career as singer and actor. 

It’s good to see that non-film music is slowly picking up again. My new single, a fun song called Sajan Main Nachungi, was launched in August. It is based on the theme of a bachelorette. I’m hoping to release another song in the next few months and intend to bring out more songs regularly.

(As told to Lubna Salim)