Salma Agha

Biography

Salma Agha (born 25 October 1956) is a British singer and actress who worked in Indian and Pakistani films and in the 1980s and the early 1990s. She is best known for her acting and singing the song "Dil ke Armaan" in the film Nikaah (1982).

Early life

Salma Agha was born in Karachi, Pakistan to Liaqat Gul Agha (born Liaqat Gul Tajik) and his wife Nasreen (born Zarina Ghaznavi). Salma started singing songs in school festivals and other programs, she was raised in London, where she received several film offers from Indian directors.
Salma's father was a tradesman dealing in rugs and belonged to an Urdu-speaking Pashtun family from Amritsar. Agha traces the origin of her surname 'Aagha' to her Pashtun ancestors from Afghanistan. Her father traded in precious stones and antiques in Iran. He was given the title Aagha there, an honorific given to a businessman of repute."
Her mother, a musician, was the daughter of music composer Rafiq Ghaznavi and his wife Anwari Bai Begum, who was one of the earliest actresses of Indian cinema, starring in Heer Ranjha (1932). Anwari and Rafiq Ghaznavi separated after Nasreen's birth, and Anwari then married an Indian businessman named Jugal Kishore Mehra, who legally adopted Nasreen. Mehra was a Punjabi Hindu who converted to Islam and took the name Ahmed Salman and later moved to Pakistan after the partition of India.
Mehra was a first cousin of Indian actors Raj Kapoor, Shammi Kapoor and Shashi Kapoor of the Kapoor family, because their mother, Ramsarni Kapoor (née Mehra), was the sister of his father.
Raj Kapoor, who met Agha in London when she was young saw her and was interested in casting her in his film Henna. However, Mehra, Agha's maternal grandfather, objected. Later, at Neetu Singh and Rishi Kapoor's wedding ceremony in London, Raj Kapoor introduced Agha to director and film producer B. R. Chopra, who cast her as the female lead in his blockbuster 1982 film Nikaah, replacing Zeenat Aman.

Career

Her first film was the romance Nikaah (1982), in which she starred as the female lead and also sang several of the film's songs herself. She was nominated for the Filmfare awards that year in both the Best Actress category and the Best Female Playback Singer category. It was for her singing that she won the Filmfare Best Female Playback Award. She is also known for her role in Kasam Paida Karne Wale Ki (1984) opposite Mithun Chakraborty, and for her song "Come Closer" from the same film.

Personal life

Salma Agha was in a relationship in the 1980s with London-based businessman Mahmud Sipra. This relationship lasted many years, during which time Salma made her film debut, but it did not develop into marriage.
She has been married three times. Her first husband was Pakistani actor Javed Sheikh in the 1980s. She was then married to the Pakiatani squash player Rahmat Khan of the Khan squash family (and the father of Natasha Khan through his first marriage) from 1989 to 2010 and they have two children together – Zara "Sasha" Agha Khan and Ali Agha Khan (Liaqat Ali Khan).
In 2011, she married Manzar Shah, a Dubai-based businessman. She lives in Mumbai, where her daughter Zara works in Bollywood films.
In January 2017, she was granted Overseas Citizenship of India status by the Indian government.