26th March 2008 :: Sony and Tony

I guess about 25 years ago Gulshan Kumar or "Gullu" started his business of audio tapes. He started with a brand called "Tony" and there is no need to tell you who the inspiration was. It was a long time ago so I vaguely remember that the apart from being called Tony the tapes had something written in Japanese as well to make them look all the more authentic. Gulshan Kumar is another story since what he copied was not just a name. He copied content too. In the initial years he made money by hiring singers like Sonu Nigam and Anuradha Paudwal to do the cover versions of Mohd. Rafi and Asha and Lata. He also too advantage of poor IPR laws and sold the soundtracks of moves with "Jhankar Beats". Jhankar Beats is still very popular but now it is called "remix". He was smart and changed the name from Tony to T-Series before he got famous enough to be embarrassed by it.