Daler Mehndi sings for Rajini

Bhangra king Daler Mehndi singing songs in Tamil and Telugu may sound strange, but that is exactly what he is doing now. He is making a foray into southern cinema with the much-talked-about Kuselan, starring Tamil superstar Rajinikant.

The movie is being made in Tamil and Telugu and Mehndi, who gave hit Punjabi pop songs like Bolo ta ra ra and Dardi rab rab, has sung a song each in both versions in his inimitable style.

"Oyam zaarare is the most peppy number of the movie," said Kulmeet Makkar, chief executive officer of BIG Music & Home Entertainment, which is releasing the album July 1.

Apart from Mehndi, an array of singing stars like Shankar Mahadevan, Hariharan, Sujata, Chitra, Sadhna Sargam, Shreya Ghosal, Kailash Kher and Prasanna VV have lent their voice for Kuselan. Music maestro AR Rahman's nephew GV Prakash, better known as GV, has composed music for the movie.

Directed by PVasu, "Kuselan is said to be partly Rajinikant's biography as it is based on some incidents of his chequered life. The film is about a friendship between a barber and a superstar called Ashok Raj.

"Rajinikant portraying 20 different characters in the course of a song is one of the highlights of the movie," said Umesh Pai, BIG Music's business head for southern India.