Alka Yagnik

Alka Yagnik (born 20 March 1966) is a Indian playback singer who worked predominantly in Hindi cinema during late 80s to early 2000s. One of the most prominent singers of 1990s era Bollywood, she has received several accolades, including two National Film Awards, two Bengal Film Journalists' Association Awards and seven Filmfare Awards for Best Female Playback Singer from thirty-seven nominations. Alka has been described in the media as one of the greatest and most influential singers in Hindi cinema. She is cited as the 'Melody Queen' of Indian Cinema. Alka is one of the most successful and most popular female singers who reigned the Bollywood music industry for over two decades. Yagnik is one of the most prolific female playback singers and artists, and has sung a large number of female solos in her Bollywood career. In her career spanning over four decades she has sung songs for more than thousand films and recorded over 22 thousand songs in over 25 different languages. Twenty of her tracks feature in BBC's list of top forty Bollywood soundtracks of all-time. She is Ranked No.1 on the YouTube's Music Charts & Insights list of top global artists as of July 2025. She has been on the chart for years, with around 360-400 million views per week, around 18 billion views per year, an all-time unmatched record. Yagnik has been recognised as the most streamed artist in the world by Guinness World Records with 15.3 billion YouTube views in 2022, with which some 12.3 billion or 80% are registered users from India, she is also the most listened to artist in Pakistan garnering 683 million views. The record book further reported that, "Kolkata-born Yagnik, 56, has been the most popular artist on the platform for the past three years, with 17 billion streams in 2021 and 16.6 billion in 2020."