Popular singer Adnan Sami became an Indian citizen in 2016, giving up his Pakistani citizenship. While he received flak from across the border for the move, Sami has always maintained that he is proud to be a citizen of India. In fact, he was also awarded the Padma Shri, the fourth-highest civilian award of the Republic of India, earlier this year.

Adnan Sami reveals Asha Bhosle`s advice to him

Adnan Sami has now revealed the real reason behind starting to make music in India. “After the songs I released in 1998, people in the Pakistani music industry thought I was finished. So they didn’t provide any marketing for those songs. Nobody got to know when the album was released—it just vanished. I was very dejected. I was in Canada at that time. I knew they’d done that on purpose,” recalled Sami in an interview with India TV.

Sami shared that he had discussed the issue with singer Asha Bhosle back then. She had sung popular tracks like “Kabhi To Nazar Milao” from his 1997 album Badaltey Mausam with him. “I told Ashaji I’m dejected because people here have decided they don’t want to work with me for whatever reason, and that I want to record with her in London,” said Sami.