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‘AR Rahman doesn’t know Hindi’: Rabbi Shergill says lyrics in Bollywood became ‘secondary’ with composer

Singer Rabbi Shergill, who crooned popular tracks like “Bulla Ki Jaana” and “Tere Bin”, spoke about working with AR Rahman and shared his view that the composer does not prioritise lyrics in his songs.

3 min readChennaiJan 22, 2026 11:22 AM IST

Rabbi Shergill called AR Rahman spiritually evolved. (Pic: Divas Gupta/YT, Rahman/Instagram)

Music composer AR Rahman recently made headlines for his remarks about getting less work over the last eight years, as he suggested that the film industry may be growing communal. Several celebrities have shared their perspectives on Rahman’s statement in the past few weeks. Recently, singer Rabbi Shergill, who crooned popular tracks like “Bulla Ki Jaana” and “Tere Bin”, spoke about working with Rahman and shared his view that the composer does not prioritise lyrics in his songs.

Rabbi made these comments during a podcast conversation with Divas Gupta, which was recorded before Rahman’s BBC Asia interview went viral. Speaking about the Oscar-winning composer, Rabbi said, “I admire Rahman for his creative genius. He is a genius. There is no doubt about it. But Rahman phase is not pro poetry or pro lyrics phase in Hindi film industry. It means that the words in his songs are just ornaments and not the whole thing.”

He further added, “I feel after Rahman came, the lyrics in the Hindi film industry became secondary and if lyrics become secondary, that means expression becomes secondary, it means that somewhere your humanity and existence become secondary, this is my issue with Rahman.”

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However, Rabbi clarified that he does not blame Rahman for this, pointing out that Hindi is not the composer’s primary language. “It is not his fault because it is not his language. He doesn’t understand it. The stuff that he does in Tamil music is really representative of him. It is another ball game, at least that’s what I hear.”

Talking about Rahman as a human being and his spiritual side, Rabbi said, “At human level, I found him incredibly soft and extremely nice. I think he spends his time in pursuits that are almost saintly. People tell me that if he has time for two days, he will just disappear and will be found at a Sufi shrine. Deep down, he is spiritually a very evolved person. My only issue is and it is not even with him. It is with the music industry. If somebody doesn’t understand your language, I think it was your call. You need to explain all of that to him.”

AR Rahman earlier spoke about learning Hindi, Urdu, Arabic and even Punjabi later in his career, years after making a mark in the Hindi film industry. “It was after ten years of my career that I realised this,” he shared. “I even learned a bit of Arabic from our holy book, the Quran. Between 1994 and 1997, I devoted time to studying and reading the Quran Sharif. When I met Subhash Ghai, he told me, ‘You’re a great composer, but without learning Hindi, you won’t last.’ I thought it was beautiful advice. I took it seriously and learned Hindi and Urdu,” Rahman added. “The love from Hindi-speaking audiences around the world is extraordinary — and now, I even love Punjabi too.”

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