Uday Sotang, singer and lyricist of Chin chin mai hasna mann lagcha

The voice behind some of the melodious and touchy numbers like ‘Chin chin mai hasna mann lagcha’, ‘Timi bina bachna garo bho’, ‘Mann jo jalan badhi nai rahyo’, etc. Uday Sotang is one of the most popular singers of Nepal. Singing together with his wife Malina Sotang, this husband-wife duo has a huge fan following not only in Nepal but worldwide (Nepalese living around the globe).



Born in Darjeeling, he did his schooling at St. Roberts School and graduated from Darjeeling Government College. He started singing since his school days, however, it was only during his plus two (higher secondary) days that he started learning classical music. He met his wife Manila while he was learning classical music.

He had the opportunity to sing two songs in an album that was produced by his school and those two became his first recorded songs. Pama Lama had composed the music of the songs and the lyrics were penned by Govind Pradhan. Besides that, he also used to perform on stage during various programs.

A peace-lover by nature, he had fought for democracy during the state of emergency with his songs and voices. He went underground when two of his singer friends were arrested for asking their rights and his name got added to the wanted list although he never was involved in any violent activities. Apart from being involved in a clash between the show organizers and artists in 1983, he swears never being involved in any violent activities since date.

Sometime around 1986, he came to Nepal and with the help of musician Bulu Mukarung, he went to Radio Nepal for voice test. He sang few songs after passing the test. He, Mukarung and musician Nyhoo Bajracharya used to sit in his room and listen to Bajracharya‘s compositions and used to exchange ideas.

They released their first album ‘Jhajalko’ in the year 1991 and later in 1993, released another album ‘Darpan’. It was followed by ‘Muskan’ in 1997 and ‘Bhid Dekhi Bahira’ in 1999. Then came ‘Katha’ in 2001 and ‘Atmakatha’ in 2003, followed by ‘Upama’ in 2004, ‘Marma’ in 2005 and ‘Mantabya’ in 2006. Among all these, his personal favorite is ‘Marma‘ as it incorporates his own story and he himself wrote the song ‘Chin chin mai hasna mann lagcha‘.

Although he, sometimes, writes lyrics, compose music along with singing, Uday Sotang likes to call himself a singer more than anything else and why not? he has given us so many melodious songs to remember him forever. He loves photography and also, football and volleyball are two of the games he used to play. An avid follower of football matches, Liverpool is his favorite football team.