40 Facts About Monali Thakur

Monali Thakur was born on 3 November 1985 and is an Indian playback singer.

Monali Thakur is the recipient of several awards including a National Film Award for Best Female Playback Singer for the song "Moh Moh Ke Dhaage" from the film Dum Laga Ke Haisha and a Filmfare Award for Best Female Playback Singer for the song "Sawaar Loon" from the film Lootera.

Monali Thakur was a judge of Zee TV's singing reality show Sa Re Ga Ma Pa L'il Champs 2014.

Monali Thakur was an "expert" on Colors TV's Rising Star for two consecutive seasons.

Monali Thakur's father Shakti Thakur was a professional singer and actor in Bengali film industry and her sister Mehuli Thakur is a playback singer in Bengal.

Monali Thakur has learnt hip-hop and Bharatanatyam and is a trained salsa dancer.

An alumnus of The Future Foundation School and St Xavier's College, Kolkata, Monali Thakur started singing in school and college competitions and performing at local functions.

Monali Thakur received the Best Playback Singer Award at Anandalok Awards for it when she was 14.

Monali Thakur rose to popularity after placing ninth in Indian Idol 2.

Monali Thakur had to struggle even after Indian Idol to get a strong foothold in the music industry.

Monali Thakur started her career in 2000 with the song 'Sundar Kato Sundar' from the Bengali movie Sajoni Aamar Sohag, sung along with Kavita Krishnamurti, Goutam Ghose and Pratik Choudhary.

About her experience with Indian Idol, which ran for up to six months, Monali Thakur said that she was mostly nervous the entire time.

Post-Indian Idol, Monali Thakur made her singing debut with the song "Kabool Kar Le" in the 2006 film Jaan-E-Mann, composed by Anu Malik; who was one of the judges in Indian Idol.

In 2008, Monali Thakur rose to prominence with the songs "Zara Zara Touch Me" and "Khwab Dekhe " in the film Race, composed by Pritam.

Monali Thakur considers the former of the songs to be her first real breakthrough.

Monali Thakur got nominated for an IIFA Award for Best Female Playback and an Apsara Award for Best Female Playback Singer for the song "Zara Zara Touch Me".

The song received mixed reviews from critics but Monali Thakur was praised for her vocals.

In 2013, Monali Thakur sang "Sawaar Loon", composed by Amit Trivedi from the film Lootera.

Monali Thakur gets the chance to sing a semi-classical number for the first time and she truly shines, Joginder Tuteja of Bollywood Hungama stated about 'Meri Jaaniye' "It is good to see Monali Thakur wear a different hat for this one and step into a Western avtar".

Monali Thakur performed a female solo 'Laila' in Nasha, composed by musical duo Sangeet-Siddharth, the song was well received and called a sweet one.

In 2014, Monali Thakur made her film debut with Lakshmi dealing with the harsh realities of human trafficking and child prostitution, which continues behind closed curtains in rural areas of India.

Monali Thakur won Best Actress Award at the South-Asian International Film Festival in Washington DC, making her the first Bollywood singer to have won.

Mitesh Saraf of 'Planet Bollywood' appreciated the song "Bappi Lahiri and Monali Thakur takes centre stage and both does really well in maintaining the entertainment quotient" while, Rediff.

Monali Thakur provided English Vocals in the song 'Love Me Thoda Aur' sung by Arijit Singh for the film Yaariyan.

Monali Thakur was a judge in the Bengali music reality show Bengali Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Li'l Champs for two years.

Monali Thakur appeared in the Bengali show Key Hobe Biggest Fan and was part of Coke Studio.

Monali Thakur began the new year with a song 'Turram Khan' in Hawaizaada, co-sung by Papon and Ayushmann Khurrana.

Prateek Sur of 'Bollywood Life' commented, "Monali Thakur impresses with her melodic vocals".

In 2018, Monali Thakur appeared in the Zee5 show Lockdown along with Mickey Singh which was produced by Badshah's production house Afterhours.

Apart from these Monali Thakur has sung several super-hits like "Cham Cham" song from 2016 film Baaghi, which has garnered more than 1 Billion views on YouTube as of January 2022 and The Title Track of 2018 film "Badrinath Ki Dulhania", which she sang along with Neha Kakkar, Dev Negi and Ikka Singh, has been watched more than 800 Million times on Youtube as of January 2022.

In 2020 Monali Thakur has sung 2 more singles: "Aaina" along with Ranajoy Bhattacharjee and "Elo Maa Dugga Monali Thakur" along with Sonu Nigam.

Monali Thakur made her acting debut in Raja Sen's Bengali film Krishnakanter Will, in which she played Bhromor.

The film is about human trafficking and child prostitution and Monali Thakur plays a 15-year-old girl who gets trapped in it.

Monali Thakur was seen in a guest appearance as a Kashmiri Girl in 2014 film PK.

Monali Thakur has a played a cameo role in film Secret Superstar released in 2017.

Monali Thakur will be seen in Abbas Tyrewala's multistarrer Mango.

Monali Thakur acted in a short film titled Jangle Bells along with Namit Das.

Monali Thakur married Maik Richter, a restaurateur based in Switzerland, in 2017.

Monali Thakur made the marriage public only in June 2020 after releasing her single "Dil Ka Fitoor", which features her along with Maik.

Monali Thakur has sung numerous songs of different languages including Hindi, Bengali, Tamil, and Kannada.