From YouTube to giving wings to a million dreams

A year later,Jasleen Royal’s venture has fetched more than one lakh hits on YouTube,and the MTV Music award. The music channel is also using the Ludhiana girl’s song as the theme song for the Johnson & Johnson-sponsored ‘The Dream Project’ in collaboration with MTV which aims at “fulfilling the small dreams of women” like buying shoes,eating chicken burger,or village girl wanting to visit a city and eating in a restaurant.

“We privileged ones never realise how small the dreams of unprivileged people are. I realised this after shooting the video with a girl whose only dream was to have a chocolate,” says Royal whose video was re-shot in Mumbai by MTV.

“In the original video,a friend of mine had written ‘starting a family’ as his dream. This was just after his wife had a miscarriage. It was then that I realised the meaning of this poem,” Royal says. Her next single,with lyrics by Swanand Kirkire,will be released this month.

Talking about her first video she says,she only wanted the dreams of a common man to be highlighted. “We approached random people and asked them to write their dream on a slate and then face the camera and our video was done,” says Royal,who learnt about the poem from her mother.

“We had no sponsors. Releasing song on internet (February 2012) was the only option. A call from the MTV two months later changed everything,” says Royal,who did her schooling from Sacred Heart Convent,Ludhiana,and B Com from Hindu College,New Delhi.

“I am not closed for Bollywood,but Indie is what I really enjoy,” asserts Royal whose songs Ghoomtey Firtey and Next Bus Back Home released on Internet were also widely appreciated.

Royal,who plays keyboard,guitar,mouth organ and tambourine,had also made it to semi-finals of India’s Got Talent on Colors channel in 2009.

“There are a thousand little dreams and there are one billion of us. Let’s make each dream come true,” says Royal.