Soujanya Bhagavathula from Visakhapatnam, the winner of Aha Telugu Indian Idol 2, is ecstatic. “I didn’t expect to win,” she says over the phone, still soaking in the win.
For more than 10 weeks, Soujanya’s world revolved around the show hosted by singer Hema Chandra and judges SS Thaman, Geetha Madhuri, and Karthik. A rigorous competition for weeks saw Soujanya emerge as the winner beating finalists Sruthi Nanduri (New Jersey), Jayaram Pyla (Hyderabad), Laasya Priya G (Siddipet), and Karthikeya Avasarala (Hyderabad).
Allu Arjun with the finalists | Photo Credit: Special arrangement
Soujanya was four when she began singing her grandfather Bhagavathula Krishna Rao’s compositions at home. Later, she began to give public performances with her younger sister Sireesha. Seeing the sisters’ interest in music, their father shifted from Raipur in Chattisgarh to Visakhapatnam in Andhra Pradesh in 2004. Since then, she has been learning music from M Jogulamba and had also participated in Padalani Undi on Maa TV. The show hosted by (the late) SP Balasubramanium, Soujanya believes, was a turning point. “We were introduced to old film songs and used to practise them regularly,” she recalls.
Soujanya Bhagavathula | Photo Credit: Special arrangement
In the meantime, Soujanya charted a career in IT and pursued music. Her efforts paid off when she got to sing Gundello in the Vijay Deverakonda-starrer Arjun Reddy. Her playback singing came to a halt after her marriage. “I had to move to Pune after my marriage and my software job didn’t give me much time to travel to Hyderabad to look for opportunities in playback singing.”
Soujanya quit her MNC job after five years and participated in the first edition of Indian Idol in 2021. However, being a new mother, she was unable to travel to Hyderabad for the final round of auditions. Nevertheless, her second attempt in the second edition of the reality show saw her emerge as the winner. “My goal was not to win but only to come back to singing.”
She terms every episode of Indian Idol as magical , but the round when she was asked to sing a lullaby by Geeta Madhuri, one of the judges, is close to her heart. Soujanya sang Neelala Kannullo from the movie Natakala Rayudu, which she often sings to her 20-month-old daughter. “It had been four weeks since I was away from my baby and I was missing her a lot. When I finished the song, my baby was in front of me. This was a surprise planned by the team!”
From singing semi-classical and melodious numbers to learning other genres… Soujanya’s forte is versatility Her sister Sireesha, an engineer , is already a playback singer in Hindi, Telugu and Tamil. The Bhagavathula sisters perform concerts and have also released devotional albums.
Soujanya hopes to follow ‘Suseela garu for her clarity in singing and Vani Jairam garu for high pitches’ and be a playback singer like her role model Shreya Ghoshal.
