Composer Yashraj Mukhate On How The Viral ‘Rasode Mein Kaun Tha’ Video Has Changed His Life

Rasode mein kaun tha? – the question that has taken the internet by storm. Six days ago, when 24-year-old composer Yashraj Mukhate uploaded a 57-second video of him remixing a frivolous line of dialogue from a stereotypical TV soap opera, he didn't anticipate getting almost 10 million views and becoming an internet sensation within a week.

Mukhate's comical twist on the hilariously exaggerated lines from Kokilaben – a fictional character from the 2010 Star Plus series Saath Nibhana Saathiya – has been shared far and wide, even by the likes of singer Prateek Kuhad and actors such as Rajkummar Rao, Taapsee Pannu and Varun Dhawan.

Amidst his newfound online fame, the composer spoke to us about life as a viral sensation, becoming a meme and being DM'd by Anurag Kashyap.

Edited Excerpts:

What's the last week been like?

It's been insane. I'm still getting messages and calls. My DMs are full and my followers and subscribers are consistently increasing. I don't know what to do. Brands are messaging me to collaborate, I've even been DM'd by some music directors and filmmakers. It's a little overwhelming.

How much has your social media following increased since you dropped the video?

When I uploaded this video I had around 24k followers on Instagram, now it's almost 6 lakhs. And I had around 8k subscribers on YouTube, which has also now crossed 600k, and that's in less than a week.

So many big names have shared your video. Which reaction surprised you the most? 

The best and the coolest person who shared it was Anurag Kashyap. I'm the biggest Anurag Kashyap fan and it was amazing. For me, no amount of views or subscribers came close to that. I showed it to my parents and friends and everyone because they all know how much of a fan I am. Whenever I'm feeling low, I watch certain scenes from Gangs of Wasseypur and I instantly feel better. The day after he shared it he DM'd me saying that he's checked out my work and he shared his number and said 'let's connect'. For me, that was just something else.

You said your main focus is your music, but now is there a pressure to make only these short, funny videos? Are you worried that's what people will expect from you?

Yes that it's there, but it's not something that I don't enjoy. I love making these videos and it is bringing more audience for my real content. I knew short content always works and Instagram is all about short content. But I didn't think that it would become so big. But this was not my ultimate aim. My aim was I wanted people to hear my music which I attached to this dialogue. It just happened to be that it was funny and entertaining and people have seen the serial, so they shared it and it went viral. Otherwise my ultimate aim was to make people listen to my original compositions. And that's happening. Because of this video they are coming to my profile and listening to the other compositions

I'm guessing people are also sending you a whole lot of suggestions of different TV shows and scenes to make videos out of ? 

Yes, people are sending me their own recordings and all kinds of clips and telling me to make videos out of this. There's also so many covers and memes. I was really impressed with the memes. There are some amazing things people are creating with the video.