Accountancy was my Plan B: Sri Lankan singing sensation Yohani de Silva

It’s not always that Bollywood megastar Amitabh Bachchan calls a song ‘impossible’ to stop listening and grooves to it in a meme video. Quite evidently, Sinhalese viral track ‘Manike mage hithe’, which translates to ‘Baby in my heart’, has taken the music world by mellifluous storm—cutting across cultural and language boundaries.

Sung by Sri Lankan singer Yohani de Silva, the number went viral, several lakh reels on Instagram were shared and has crossed 150 million views on YouTube. It has inspired scores of singers to create their own versions and led dance buffs to make their Insta Reels. And the 28-year-old Yohani, who says she often gets mistaken for a teenager, is lapping up her musical moment in the sun.

“There are two parts to my song going viral. First, it trended on social media. Literally, everyone in Sri Lanka had heard it. Then it went viral all over again after Bollywood Superstar Amitabh Bachchan shared it on his social media feed on August 15. The rest is history,” says Yohani, who was on a two-city tour to Gurugram and Hyderabad this month to perform on the Zee Live SuperMoon #NowTrending show.

Bachchan shared an edited meme video from Kaalia showing him dancing to ‘Manike mage hithe’ where the original ‘Jahan teri yeh nazar hai’ has been replaced with the Sri Lankan hit song. Attributing the video edit to his granddaughter Navya Naveli, he commented that it was ‘impossible to stop listening to the song’. Not surprisingly, Indians tuned in to her and she found herself in India for a live performance.