Big B to record Hanuman Chalisa

"Chala-ja raha tha main darta hua, Hanuman Chalisa padhta hua. Bolo - Hanuman ki Jai!" These of course are the lines from the lilting Mere Pass Ao Mere Doston song from Mr Natwarlal that Big B sang himself.And now the man is going to record the real thing as a devotional number.

Composer Aadesh Shrivastava, famous for being a judge on any number of reality shows, has helped compose the melody. "I'd call it his great creative effort," Bachchan said.The star said a "new youth-oriented" version of the chant had been on his mind long."Wherever I've played the 'Hanuman Chalisa' so far people have found it to be a divine experience - hair-raising, goose bumpy, that's how the endeavour has been described so far.

"I guess it's more to do with the nature of the project than the singing. There's a deep connect with the 'Hanuman Chalisa' in perhaps every Hindu home. We've all grown up reciting it. It still plays an important part in our lives."

The next project in the star's schedule is to record a new version of the Bagvad Gita. This will thrill people, religious or otherwise, because the sound of that gravelly baritone echoing the powerful lines of Krishna and Arjun will probably the ultimate goose-flesh flarer.

"It's one of my father's unknown and unacknowledged masterpieces, of immense literary and religious value," says Big B of the version of the epic that will be recorded. "We'll be doing a musical version that he had translated into the language and meter of the Ramayan. In this, the centenary year of my father's existence I can think of no better tribute."