Salma Agha (born 25 October 1956) is a British singer and actress who worked in Indian and Pakistani films and in the 1980s and the early 1990s. She is best known for her acting and singing the song "Dil ke Armaan" in the film Nikaah (1982).
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Early life
Salma Agha was born in Karachi, Pakistan to Liaqat Gul Agha (born Liaqat Gul Tajik) and his wife Nasreen (born Zarina Ghaznavi). Salma started singing songs in school festivals and other programs, she was raised in London, where she received several film offers from Indian directors.
Salma's father was a tradesman dealing in rugs and belonged to an Urdu-speaking Pashtun family from Amritsar. Agha traces the origin of her surname 'Aagha' to her Pashtun ancestors from Afghanistan. Her father traded in precious stones and antiques in Iran. He was given the title Aagha there, an honorific given to a businessman of repute."
Her mother, a musician, was the daughter of music composer Rafiq Ghaznavi and his wife Anwari Bai Begum, who was one of the earliest actresses of Indian cinema, starring in Heer Ranjha (1932). Anwari and Rafiq Ghaznavi separated after Nasreen's birth, and Anwari then married an Indian businessman named Jugal Kishore Mehra, who legally adopted Nasreen. Mehra was a Punjabi Hindu who converted to Islam and took the name Ahmed Salman and later moved to Pakistan after the partition of India.