Ameen Sayani Biography 
Ameen Sayani is a very popular radio announcer from India during the golden era of Radio Ceylon. He is still remembered for presenting the popular countdown show of Radio Ceylon, Binaca geet mala, which is regarded as the most popular Indian Radio Program ever! Radio listeners have not forgotten yet his unique style of addressing crowd with "Behno aur Bhaiyo". He has one among the popular radio artists who have been regularly mimicked at stage shows.
He was born on December 21, 1932 and now he resides at Mumbai. He was introduced to All-India Radio, Mumbai, by his brother Hamid Sayani. At first he participated in English programs on radio for 10 years. Later he became one of the leading radio jockeys who popularized Radio Ceylon in India. Radio Ceylon is the oldest radio station in South Asia and has been popular in India for playing Hindi film songs, at a time when Radio was the only medium to hear film songs. It was a time when only classical music was played in All India Radio. Manohar Mahajan, Amin Sayani and Gopal Sharma are the golden names related to the golden era of Radio Ceylon post Indian independence.
Sayani, through the popular program Binaca Geet Mala popularized Radio Ceylon as the leader of the airwaves in South Asia and people used to turn on radio only to hear his voice to listen to the only countdown show on film music, Binaca Geet Mala. In those days, particularly 1960’s and 1970’s, it was regarded as a matter of pride for Hindi songs if featured in Binaca Geet Mala and this countdown program was widely regarded as the best survey of popularity of Hindi film songs in that era.
Sayani has appeared as announcer of events in many Bollywood movies like - Bhoot Bungla, Teen Devian, Boxer and Qatl. From 1945 to 1960, Sayani also assisted his mother in editing the journal Rahber, started by Mahatma Gandhi. He is active in Radio still now and has been awarded Padma Shri in the year 2009.
Published: N/A
Updated: February 17, 2014
