''Roja'' is the debut

soundtrack album A soundtrack album is any album that incorporates music directly recorded from the soundtrack of a particular feature film or television show. The first such album to be commercially released was Walt Disney's ''Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs ( ...

of music composer

A. R. Rahman Allah Rakha Rahman (; born A. S. Dileep Kumar; 6 January 1967), also known by the initialism ARR, is an Indian music composer, record producer, singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and philanthropist known for his works in Indian cinem ...

, featuring lyrics by

Vairamuthu Vairamuthu Ramasamy (born 13 July 1953) is an Indian lyricist, poet, and novelist working in the Tamil film industry. He is a prominent figure in the Tamil literary world. A master's graduate from the Pachaiyappa's College in Chennai, he firs ...

. It is the soundtrack to the 1992

Tamil Tamil may refer to: People, culture and language * Tamils, an ethno-linguistic group native to India, Sri Lanka, and some other parts of Asia **Sri Lankan Tamils, Tamil people native to Sri Lanka ** Myanmar or Burmese Tamils, Tamil people of Ind ...

film of the same name, directed by

Mani Ratnam Gopalaratnam Subramaniam (born 2 June 1956), known professionally as Mani Ratnam, is an Indian film director, film producer and screenwriter who predominantly works in Tamil cinema and a few Hindi, Telugu, Malayalam and Kannada films. H ...

, and starring Aravind Swamy and

Madhoo Madhoo Shah (born Madhoobala Raghunath Malini; 26 March 1969), also known formerly as Madhubala, is an Indian actress known for her works predominantly in Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam and Kannada language films. She was a part of Movies like ...

. The album features seven tracks in Tamil and Hindi, and six tracks in Malayalam, Telugu, Marathi and five tracks in the instrumental adaptation album. The song "Thamizha Thamizha" is a poem written by

Subramanya Bharathi Subramania Bharati (Born Chinnaswami Subramaniyan; 11 December 1882 – 11 September 1921) was an Indian writer, poet, journalist, teacher, Indian independence activist, social reformer and polyglot. He was bestowed the title ''Bharati'' for hi ...

. "Chinna Chinna Aasai" was the first song Rahman had composed for the film. The song "Kadhal Rojave" has two versions in both Tamil and Hindi; a solo and a duet in the former. The Hindi version of the song was titled "Roja Jaaneman" has two versions – one by S. P. Balasubrahmanyam and the other by Hariharan. Released on

Lahari Music Lahari Recording Company is an Indian music company based in Bangalore Bengaluru, also known as Bangalore (List of renamed places in India#Karnataka, its official name until 1 November 2014), is the Capital city, capital and largest cit ...

T-Series T series or T-Series may refer to: Technology * Apple T series, a family of processors * Canon T series, a line of single lens reflex cameras * Juniper T series, a core router * Sony Ericsson T series, a series of cell phones * SPARC T series, ...

, it was also listed in ''

Time Time is the continuous progression of existence that occurs in an apparently irreversible process, irreversible succession from the past, through the present, and into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequ ...

'' magazine's " 10 Best Soundtracks" of all time. It also fetched the

National Film Award for Best Music Direction The National Film Award for Best Music Direction (the Silver Lotus Award) is an honour presented annually at the National Film Awards by the National Film Development Corporation of India to a musician who has composed the best score for films ...

for

and the

National Film Award for Best Lyrics The National Film Award for Best Lyrics is an honour presented annually at the National Film Awards by the National Film Development Corporation of India (NFDC) to a lyricist who has composed the best song for films produced within the Indian c ...

for

. The

and

Hindi Modern Standard Hindi (, ), commonly referred to as Hindi, is the Standard language, standardised variety of the Hindustani language written in the Devanagari script. It is an official language of India, official language of the Government ...

versions of the album sold over million units in India, with the Tamil version selling over 200,000 units and the Hindi version selling 2.8million units. The Hindi version of the album earned in sales.

Background

after his long relationship with

Ilaiyaraaja Ilaiyaraaja (born R. Gnanathesikan) is an Indian musician, composer, arranger, conductor, orchestrator, multi-instrumentalist, lyricist and playback singer popular for his works in Indian cinema, predominately in Tamil cinema, Tamil in addition ...

, decided to collaborate with a newcomer. He initially approached advertisement jingle composer

Mahesh Mahadevan Mahesh Mahadevan was an Indian composer in the 1990s. Over the last decade of the 20th century, Mahesh composed more than 250 popular advertising jingles including the extremely popular Regaul Blue jingle. He also composed the music for six very ...

, who refused since it required full-time commitment to the project. Ratnam happened to listen to some ad jingles, composed by Rahman, in an awards function, where Rahman received the award for Best Jingle Composer. Impressed with Rahman's works, Ratnam visited his studio and listened to a tune that Rahman had composed long back on the

Kaveri River water dispute The sharing of waters of the Kaveri River has been the source of a serious conflict between the two Indian states of Tamil Nadu and Karnataka. The genesis of this conflict rests in two agreements in 1892 and 1924 between the Madras Presidency an ...

(later revealed to be "Tamizha Tamizha" from the soundtrack). Ratnam signed him immediately for his next project, ''Roja'', which was the first one in his terrorism trilogy. In an August 2016 interview with ''

Filmfare ''Filmfare'' is an Indian English-language fortnightly magazine published by Worldwide Media. Acknowledged as one of India's most popular entertainment magazines, it publishes pieces involving news, interviews, photos, videos, reviews, events, ...

'', Rahman recalled that he chose not to pursue education at

Berklee College of Music Berklee College of Music () is a Private university, private music college in Boston, Boston, Massachusetts. It is the largest independent college of contemporary music in the world. Known for the study of jazz and modern Music of the United ...

because he got to work on ''Roja''.

Development

Rahman used instruments and grand arrangements to generate an expansive sound. Songs such as "Rukkumani" had a loud thumping feel and became ingrained in pop culture. The score was performed at the Panchathan Record Inn in Chennai. The song "Thamizha Thamizha" is a poem written by

. According to some sources, "Chinna Chinna Aasai" was the first song Rahman had composed for the film. However, there exists a different, conflicting account of how the melody came about. Veteran music director

M.S. Viswanathan Manayangath Subramanian Viswanathan (24 June 1928 – 14 July 2015), also known as M.S.V., was an Indian music director, singer and actor who predominantly worked in Tamil film industry. Popularly known by the sobriquet "Mellisai Mannar" (), he ...

has publicly stated that the tune to Chinna Chinna Aasai was, in fact, his composition, claiming it was one of the many melodies he composed during a composing session for director

K.Balachander Kailasam Balachandar (9 July 1930 – 23 December 2014) was an Indian playwright, film director, film producer, screenwriter and actor who worked mainly in the Tamil cinema. He was well known for his distinct film-making style, and the Indian fi ...

's 1977 movie

Pattina Pravesam ''Pattina Pravesam'' ( ) is a 1977 Indian Tamil-language drama film written and directed by K. Balachander. It is based on the play of the same name, written by Visu and staged the same year. The film stars Delhi Ganesh, Sivachandran and Sarath ...

. For the lyrics of song, Vairamuthu revealed that the song took two and half hours to write and he wrote 120 desires in the song but later shortened it into 16 and also revealed that he used the lines of a song which was originally composed for Doordarshan. The song "Kadhal Rojave" is set in the

Kapi Kapi, Kapı, or KAPI may refer to: Places * Kapi, Estonia, a village in Estonia * Kapı, Karataş, a village in Turkey * a possible old volcanic eruption site near Krakatoa People * Mari Kapi (1950–2009), Papua New Guinean judge * Mustaf ...

raga. Regarding the music Mani Ratnam says, "I was trying to do a film, I wanted good music and I was searching for somebody who would and I heard a demonstration tape of his which he had sent across. I thought that in the first note of the piece that he had sent me was really brilliant, really outstanding piece. So I went across to his studio and he played me some more, lots of things which he had done for jingles and a few other musical pieces he has done for somebody else. They were quite amazing and I had no doubts that he would be right for my film." For the Hindi version of the soundtrack, Alka Yagnik and Kumar Sanu were offered to sing the songs, but both declined as they did not know about Rahman at that time.

Release history

The soundtrack album was originally released in

on 27 July 1992. The soundtrack was later released in

Malayalam Malayalam (; , ) is a Dravidian languages, Dravidian language spoken in the Indian state of Kerala and the union territories of Lakshadweep and Puducherry (union territory), Puducherry (Mahé district) by the Malayali people. It is one of ...

and

Telugu Telugu may refer to: * Telugu language, a major Dravidian language of South India ** Telugu literature, is the body of works written in the Telugu language. * Telugu people, an ethno-linguistic group of India * Telugu script, used to write the Tel ...

in 1993 and in

and

Marathi Marathi may refer to: *Marathi people, an Indo-Aryan ethnolinguistic group of Maharashtra, India **Marathi people (Uttar Pradesh), the Marathi people in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh *Marathi language, the Indo-Aryan language spoken by the Mar ...

in 1994 by

Magnasound Magnasound was an Indian record company that specialized in Indian classical music, Indian rock and Indipop. It was distributed by OMI Music Inc. Shashi Gopal was the managing director of Magnasound. History Shashi Gopal founded Magnasound ...

. The instrumental special version featuring five songs was released in Tamil and Telugu by Lahari Music in 1993 and in Hindi by Magnasound in 1994.

Reception and influence

Rahman introduced new orchestral melodies in Indian film soundtracks, which till then was based on a few traditional Indian instruments. ''Time'' magazine's noted film critic,

Richard Corliss Richard Nelson Corliss (March 6, 1944 – April 23, 2015) was an American film critic and magazine editor for ''Time''. He focused on movies, with occasional articles on other subjects. He was the former editor-in-chief of ''Film Comment ...

stated in 2005 that the "astonishing debut work parades Rahman's gift for alchemizing outside influences until they are totally Tamil, totally Rahman," naming it one of the magazine's " 10 Best Soundtracks" of all time. Through ''Roja'' several singers got their breakthrough in the Tamil music scene as well.

Sujatha Mohan Sujatha Mohan is a renowned Indian playback singer known for her contributions to a wide range of Indian film industries, particularly in Malayalam, Tamil, and Telugu cinema. Over her decades-long career, she has also recorded songs in other ...

Unni Menon Nambalatt Narayanankutty Menon (born 2 December 1955), known better by his stage name Unni Menon is an Indian film playback singer. He has recorded over 4000 songs in many Indian languages including Malayalam, Tamil language, Tamil, Telugu lang ...

and

Minmini Minmini (born P. J. Rosily; 12 August 1970) is a South Indian film playback singer. She is best remembered for the song "Chinna Chinna Aasai" from '' Roja'', the debut work of film composer A. R. Rahman, which was dubbed in Hindi as "Choti S ...

, who is only known as the singer of "Chinna Chinna Aasai", probably her best known song in her entire career, were noticed following their performances in ''Roja'', while noted

ghazal ''Ghazal'' is a form of amatory poem or ode, originating in Arabic poetry that often deals with topics of spiritual and romantic love. It may be understood as a poetic expression of both the pain of loss, or separation from the beloved, and t ...

singer Hariharan made his Tamil debut through this album. Rahman even had musically untrained elderly women sing. A Bengali song was made from song "Chinna Chinna Aasai", "Chotto ei grame choto ai aasha", from Bengali film Ranga Bou 1999. In the 2023 film ''Animal'', a medley of the instrumentals of Kadhal Rojave, Tamizha Tamizha and Chinna Chinna Aasai was used as background music during the introduction of

Ranbir Kapoor Ranbir Kapoor (; born 28 September 1982) is an Indian actor known for his work in Hindi-language films. He is one of the highest-paid actors of Hindi cinema and has featured in ''Forbes India'' Celebrity 100 list since 2012. Kapoor is the re ...

's character. In the 2025 film ''The Diplomat'', the track "Bharat" was re-used during the end credits.

Awards

A. R. Rahman won the

, the first time ever by a debutant. Rahman also earned

Tamil Nadu State Film Award for Best Music Director The Tamil Nadu State Film Award for Best Music Director is given by the state government as part of its annual Tamil Nadu State Film Awards for Tamil ( Tamil Movie Industry) feature films. Both Ilaiyaraaja and A. R. Rahman have won this award for ...

and Filmfare Best Music Director Award (Tamil) for his work.

won the

for "Chinna Chinna Aasai", while

won the

Tamil Nadu State Film Award for Best Female Playback The Tamil Nadu State Film Award for Best Female Playback Singer is given by the state government as part of its annual Tamil Nadu State Film Awards for Tamil (Kollywood) films. The list Here is a list of the award winners and the films for wh ...

for the same song.

Track listing

Tamil

Hindi

Malayalam

Telugu

Marathi

Instrumental adaptation

An instrumental adaptation album was also released. The album was released in Tamil, Telugu and Hindi.