How Asha Bhosle ruled Instagram 40 years after this song’s release, which Gen-Z couldn’t get enough of

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Performed by Kishore Kumar and Asha Bhosle, the track had been composed by Bappi Lahiri. Part of the film Sharabi, starring Amitabh Bachchan, Om Prakash, Pran, and Jaya Prada, the song is one of Bappi’s most ingenious tracks ever. Every composer has a soft corner for one particular instrument, and Bappi climbs the top of a mountain to profess his love for the saxophone. Charlie Parker and John Coltrane would be proud of whoever this unsung hero of the track is, as the musician delivers a performance which almost feels bound by the vocals present. It could have been just a solo track, and it still would have made for a beautiful track. But we had Kishore and Asha to lend their voices, and while the former glides through the track with ease, Asha forgets her usually subtle and soft demeanour and challenges the pop artists of the world with a masterful performance in the second half of the song.

The track has been used for a total of 1.2 million times on Instagram, but the interesting thing about this song becoming a trend is that it became one in parts and not all at once. If you save the audio on Instagram and swipe down for three hours, you will find videos which have primarily used the first part of the track, specifically the first verse of the track where Kishore or Amitabh are describing the perfect partner. Boys and men all around the world used the audio to create videos for their male friends in a unique and refreshing moment of men expressing their love for each other (happened with me too). Slowly, as if chipping away at a complicated narrative of a film (I am looking at you, Tenet), people discovered the second half of the song, where the tempo of the track suddenly rises and Asha leaves no bar unconquered.

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Asha takes that verse by the throat, and for a brief moment you completely forget that the track started with Kishore until Asha decides to pass her the baton again. Here is where I truly believe that Bappi shines as one of the most talented music composers of his time, and I mean in the world. At this point the listener has been hearing Asha and Kishore go off at the instrumental, and Bappi needs to bring this song to an end because the length has now transcended the Bohemian Rhapsody territory (imagine pitching this to the record executive). He could go with a classic fade-out, but Bappi wants this song to land, like literally land back to the ground. In a stroke of genius, he decides to switch back to the original tempo with a crash and let the sax and the drum set do the work. This move not only ties the song perfectly, but it also makes it extremely well suited for live performances, as the singers won’t have to suddenly stop singing with a loud cymbal crash; they will instead have the opportunity to truly take in what they achieved in the last 8 minutes (it’s really that long, 8 minutes and 49 seconds to be precise) and give themselves and the composition a proper sendoff.

I was born in the 21st century, so I don’t really know about the impact the song had when it first came out in 1984. Considering the people involved with the project, it had the right ammunition to make a proper dent in record sales. But just consider this once: when Bappi originally made this track, or during the first recording session, no one would have thought that it would be used as a feature provided by an application, facilitated by a technology that didn’t exactly exist back then. But it did that; those several different instruments, musicians, notes, chords, progressions, and ideas came together to create something that truly defines longevity. Many people don’t have the patience to listen to a 9-minute song, but those who can get past that first part and wait for Asha Bhosle’s charismatic and electrifying type of performance will know that “Intehan” is one of the icon’s greatest-ever songs (cue Amitabh Bachchan in a tuxedo).