Ludhiana, India · indie-pop · singer-songwriter

Anuv Jain

1 upcoming festival

Hindi indie's softest superstar: bedroom ballads like Baarishein and Husn built on little more than voice and guitar, now filling arenas of phone lights.

Anuv Jain is from Ludhiana in Punjab and started putting Hindi songs online in the mid-2010s while studying, initially recording alone. He began writing songs at 16, with "Meri Baaton Mein Tu" his first composition, turning to songwriting as a way of processing the loss of his father a year later.

"Baarishein," written when he was 17 for a girl he was in love with, was uploaded to his channel at 21 and became a sleeper hit, later crossing 100 and then 200 million streams on Spotify. "Baarishein" and "Husn" both spread through streaming rather than radio or film soundtracks, which is unusual for Hindi-language pop of that scale.

His writing stays close to the same materials: acoustic guitar, a single vocal line, and occasional piano, with the arrangements rarely getting louder than a strummed chord. During the pandemic he committed to music full-time, releasing "Alag Aasmaan" and "Gul," and went on to perform in the UK, Australia, Dubai and Nepal, and as one of the lead singers at Post Malone's 2022 India concert.

"Husn," released in 2023, became his biggest commercial hit and the most streamed Indian song of 2024, and "Jo Tum Mere Ho" followed it to the top of the Apple Music and Spotify India charts in 2024. He was named to Forbes India's 30 Under 30 list in 2023.

He performs the songs in much the same shape on stage, with the crowd carrying a good portion of the melody. In 2024 the sound of Indian rain from "Baarishein" featured in the United Nations' Sounds Right initiative, and in 2025 he released "Afsos" with AP Dhillon and the Coke Studio India track "Arz Kiya Hai."

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indie-popsinger-songwriter