Sanskrit lyrics in telugu movies

I am not a great fan of songs nor listen to them frequently (except for those periodic bouts of playing a hit song in a loop). But, after watching Bahubali, I started noticing two things in Telugu movie songs, use of Sanskrit and songs shot on the ‘in action’ hero.  This post is dedicated to the former and I will write one on the later some other time.

Apparently, a movie called Maharshi started this way back in 1988 with a disco song in Sanskrit called ‘Oorvasi‘. This one  – ‘Om Mahapraana Deepam‘ – from Sri Manjunatha is also completely in Sanskrit.

Bahubali has a couple of songs – ‘Dheevara‘ (Hindi – ‘Khoya hai‘) and ‘Sivuni aana‘ (Hindi – ‘Kaun hai voh‘) with Sanskrit lyrics. The later actually has ‘Shiva tandava stotram‘ in it.  Reading a bit about them, I realised that the combo of M.M Keeravani (music director),  Shiva Shakti Datta (lyricist) and S.S Rajamouli (director) produced another favourite of mine, ‘Agni skalana‘ in Chatrapati.

Then there is A.R Rahman. Here are a couple from him – ‘Mangalyam‘ from Sakhi / Alaipayuthey and his version of ‘Shiva tandava stotram‘ from Lingaa. I don’t think any one beats A.R Rahman in mixing classical and devotional songs. (As an aside, just to make my point, listen to ‘Heera‘, a Kabir’s doha in Highway or ‘Ik onkar‘ from Rang de Basanti or any of his Sufi ones.)

The other one I can think of, is Bharata vedamuga from Pournami.

As I said, I don’t listen to songs that much. Will add to this list as and when, I chance upon songs in Telugu movies with Sanskrit lyrics.