Rahman bags two Grammy awards

Los Angeles, Feb 1 (IANS) Indian music maestro A.R Rahman has bagged two awards at the 52nd Annual Grammy Awards ceremony here Sunday.

The double Oscar winning composer was honoured for his compositions in Danny Boyle's rags-to-riches film "Slumdog Millionaire", getting the awards for best compilation soundtrack for a motion picture and "Jai ho" being the best motion picture song. Rahman shares the Grammy with lyricist Gulzar who penned "Jai ho".

"This is insane, god is great again," Rahman said as he accepted his second award.

"Jai ho" has been sung by Sukhvinder Singh, Tanvi Shah, Mahalaxmi Iyer, Vijay Prakash and Rahman himself. This is the first time Rahman has been nominated for a Grammy. He joins other Indian music greats like Pandit Ravi Shankar, Zakir Jussain, Vikku Vinayak and Vishvamohan Bhatt who have won a Grammy in the past.

Rahman's rivals in the soundtrack category included Steve Jordan for "Cadillac Records," Quentin Tarantino for "Inglourious Basterds", and the producers of "Twilight" and "True Blood."

In the best song category Rahman's beaten rivals included Bruce Springsteen for his song "The Wrestler", from the Oscar-nominated movie of the same name.