'Parents need to believe in their daughters, educate them to face the world' Zara Khan Agha

The gorgeous singer-songwriter and actor Zara Khan Agha talks about her latest original song 'Khud Se Zyada' composed by Tanishk Bagchi, her musical journey and her views on women empowerment in an interesting conversation with loudest.in Born to the Agha Khan Family, Zara Khan Agha comes from an illustrious family of singers her mother being the iconic Salma Agha, while her great grandmother Anwar Begum, who was married to the famous actor of yester years Jugal Kishore Mehra who was the legendary Rajkapoor Saheb's maternal uncle. Talking about her Initial grooming Khan says, "There's a famous saying the apple never falls far from the tree. So any kind of art I have been doing be it singing, acting or writing, I learned it from my mother Salma Agha and it's in the blood as my whole family is very creative. I learned classical music from my mother who has been the disciple of Ustad Mashkoor Ali Khan Saheb of the Kirana Gharana of Hindustani classical music from the age of 6." Apart from singing and acting Khan tries to write anything from scripts, poetry, and songs, as she finds writing is a powerful medium of expression. Working with Tanishk Bagchi was indeed the best thing to happen says Khan, "It was that I had sent Tanishk a single that I was working on and wanted to have his feedback on the song. He instantly liked it and asked me to come to the studio to collaborate. So we recorded the song and it just came out so well." Collaboration with VYRL Originals was an amazing experience in itself, says Khan, "When I came to know that the video will be shot by Universal I was very excited. Initially, I was nervous about the video front, how will the song be portrayed. But, when I met our director Pooja who kept everything in mind, it went off very smoothly. I feel when a song is visually well thought and put together, the audiences love it much more. A director plays a very big role in it, and of course, if you get a team of women it becomes better, chuckles Khan!...and so we look forward to working in future projects since the outcome is amazing. We did our best and have left it to the audiences. I believe in that  if you are true to your art and  know your craft and if it's  a good piece of work  audiences will definitely like it." Tanishk Bagchi and Zara Khan in collaboration with VYRL Originals made their debut as singer-songwriters with their first single ‘Khud Se Zyada’ which is a beautiful romantic track, with a young, happy, urban vibe that will make you groove instantly. Furthermore, the verses of the track act as a soul to the melody and make you live and love at the moment with every listen. The song 'has reached 27million views so far since its release and is still going strong. Khan made her film debut in Yash Raj's romantic thriller Aurangzeb, opposite Arjun Kapoor and Prithviraj Sukumaran. Throwing light on her acting stints Khan says, "I did Auranzeb when I was only 18 and wanted to experiment and do things on my own as I was learning. Post that I worked on my writing and concentrated on my music and while I was doing that, last year I was offered the film called Khoj which was very performance-oriented. The film opened at the Cannes film festival and was nominated for the Oscars as well, which earned me a lot of respect and recognition for my work for playing a girl who faces teenage bride abandonment. It's a sad reality as there are around 50000 such cases in Punjab and these girls are married to NRI boys and then they are abandoned by them for some reasons, either for some dowry or are kept as holiday wives. So at such a tender age, these girls suffer so much." Talking about her women empowerment initiatives Khan says, "I was speaking at  National Commission for Women (NCW)  last year and said that people who are doing it to the women are not to be blamed, but their parents who try to marry them at that tender age to somebody who is an NRI or has a green passport, unless they know them well. It's important for the parents to believe in their daughters, educate them and thus equipping them with the courage and strength to face the world."