TCN News
Mohammed Zahur ‘Khayyam’ Hashmi, popularly knowns as Khayyam passed away on Monday due to critical illness.
Born in undivided Punjab in Rahon, Khayyam was not interested in studies and ran away to learn music. He learnt music under Baba Chisti in Lahore and then later under Pandit Amarnath in Delhi. Although he aimed to act in films he ended up making a career as a music composer.
He has composed scores for some of the very popular songs of Hindi cinema such as Kabhi Kabhi, Umrao Jaan, Noorie, Trishul, Razia Sultan and many others.
Apart from Filmfare awards, Khayyam has been honoured with National Film Award, Sangeet Natak Akademi Award, Padma Bhushan Award and other awards.
He was battling infection of lungs but died due to cardiac arrest at a hospital in Mumbai. He was 92. Khayyam is survived by his singer wife Jagjit Kaur. The couple had a son Pradeep who died a few years ago.
The couple have founded a charity trust knowns as ‘Khayyam-Jagjit Kaur Trust’ , the money of which will go to the Federation of Western India Cine employees (WICE) who are people who work behind the scenes. The couple have donated their entire life savings in this trust.