When I bought a DVD of the movie Thalapathy, little did I know what a piece of history I was getting into. At first, the song that attracted me to the movie, Rakkamma Kaiya Thattu, was just an excellent piece of foot-tapping, hand-clapping music to me. I was yet to discover this was a song that nearly got voted as the most popular song in the world! But more on that later. Anyway I was told that this movie (from 1991) produced a string of big hits under the music directorship of Ilaiyaraja. When I watched it for myself, I thought the story is not as interesting as later Mani Ratnam movies but at least Rajinikanth is not as bombastic and ridiculous as in other movies either. I mean the very first moment our macho man appears, he is already bashing up somebody like crazy, but that is all, no silly superstar grand entrance. Some people would consider Rakkamma as the best movie opening number ever, but the other songs are also nice and effective. Sundari Kannal Oru Seithi makes a perfect song for a lazy afternoon daydreaming about your ideal romance - although Rajinikanth in samurai costume... eh, no, thank you. Chinna Thayaval is a heart-rending song for the scene where our hero watches his long-lost mother from a distance as she is praying in a temple.

Now let's come back to Rakkamma, the song that fans of Ilaiyaraja would cite to prove that he is god. First of all there can be no doubt about Ilayaraja's mastery in writing orchestral scores. A story goes that when the songs for Thalapathy were recorded in Mumbai, some northern musicians in Mumbai were also invited to play and they made a statement that in 30 years they had never seen notation sheets with such rich music or played violin in such a challenging way. As I listen to the rapid strokes on the violin in Rakkamma, I'm thinking violin music in Europe has probably never been so rowdy, except for those Hungarian dances. But the stroke of genius on Ilayaraja's part is in stripping the main music down to just the melody on vocals and the steady beats of finger snapping, against these racing violins, plus some guitar strumming at the right places. The thing is, if he had just kept the song within 5 minutes, he would already have his gigantic hit. But no, just when you think you have heard a complete song, a chorus of female humming comes in, for the scene where Shobana leads a procession with deepam in their hands. It is a devotional song from Thevaram, Kunitha Puruvamum. After that the Rakkamma theme returns, and eventually the male voice of the melody and the same beat go simultaneously with the soft humming of female voices. Like a dance blending Tandava and Lasya, that makes a perfect finish for the song, which clocks in at 6 mins 45 secs, and there you have it, a timeless classic should you have any doubt at all in the earlier minutes.

As for the poll I was going to mention, that was something conducted in 2002 by BBC for the world's most popular song. At one point in time Rakkamma was in the lead, ahead of British pop songs by The Beatles, Queen and Led Zeppelin, ahead of all other Indian songs. Imagine! But the poll got less interesting as it turned into a political exercise in showing nationalist sentiments. In the end the number 1 song was a 19th-century Irish song calling for Ireland's independence, number 2 was Vande Mataram, number 3 was a popular song called Dil Dil Pakistan, Rakkamma ending up in number 4 followed by a song in number 5 from the Tamil Tiger film Mugungal about the struggle in Sri Lanka. It was like just short of voting for national anthems. Thanks to the poll, the world may be reminded of the potato famine in Ireland, revolutionaries like Bhagat Singh and so on - all right, a good thing in that case, but to me what it suggests above all is simply that the Indian subcontinent is full of faithful BBC listeners, and I hope it will not look as if the ex-colonies are still looking up to London as a centre of cultural power to give a stamp of approval. For we should lose such colonial mentality, just like we should get rid of an addiction to soft drinks like Coca-Cola and Pepsi and drink something healthier instead.