I saw S.P. Balasubrahmanyam for the first time in the late ’60s, when he came to visit my grandfather. We had just moved from Hyderabad to Madras. He had come in a yellow-and-black taxi that he had ...

There was a time when Hindi film songs did not merely decorate cinema — they remembered it. They carried within their verses centuries of faith, rebellion, longing, philosophy and lived history. Today ...