12 Rejects, One Redemption: How Amaal Mallik Cracked “Yeh Awarapan”

Some songs take a few takes. This one took years of self-doubt, dozens of rejected versions, and a producer who refused to give up on him. In an exclusive with Pinkvilla, composer Amaal Mallik opened up about the brutal, deeply personal journey behind “Yeh Awarapan” — the title track of Emraan Hashmi’s “Awarapan 2” — and why he now calls it his best work yet.Amaal Mallik

Amaal Mallik: Story

A Song Born From Years of Self-Doubt

Mallik didn’t mince words about the rough patch that led to this song. He admitted that for the past 7-8 years he’d felt creatively stuck, taking on projects that didn’t showcase his real ability, and even leaving or getting dropped from several films along the way. “Yeh Awarapan,” he says, was his answer to all of it — a deliberate attempt to put out one song that finally defines him as a musician, after which, in his words, he has “nothing to prove anymore.”

Dozens of Rejected Versions Before It Clicked

The perfectionism behind this track is staggering. Mallik revealed he personally rejected 12 to 15 versions of the song before even playing it for producer Mukesh Bhatt — who then rejected another 6 or 7 versions himself before they finally landed on the one that made the cut. It’s a level of relentless refinement rarely talked about openly in the industry.

A Song That Mirrors His Own Life

Mallik described the track as a reflection of who he actually is — someone with no fixed routine or discipline, who creates purely when inspiration strikes. He even revealed he’s set up a bed inside his studio so he can record ideas the instant he wakes up. That same restless, all-consuming passion, he says, is baked directly into the song.

>Amaal Mallik made his debut as a film composer with Jai Ho and gained wider recognition with the song “Sooraj Dooba Hain,” which achieved commercial success and contributed to his emergence as a notable composer in Hindi Cinema, and this latest collaboration with Arijit Singh marks another milestone in that ongoing career.

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