PTI [ MONDAY, NOVEMBER 04, 2002 08:10:54 AM ]

LONDON: Indian music director and composer A R Rahman is among the top ten Asians who figure in this year's Sunday Times Pay List of the United Kingdom, with an annual income of two million pounds.

Famous for his scores in south Indian and Bollywood movies, the 36-year-old Rahman hit the international circuit after Andrew Lloyd Webber chose him for his latest musical Bombay Dreams which has become a hit and money spinner.

Rahman, who has scored for 60 films is now paid one million pounds per movie, has sold over 100 million albums. A graduate of Trinity College, Oxford, he qualifies for the Pay List because he has lived in London for most of the last two years, the newspaper said.

The top ten Asians in the list are Gurchait Chima (9.5 mn pounds), business; Gurnaik Chima (9.5 mn pounds), business; Naguib Kheraj (five mn pounds), finance; Manish Chande (4.11 mn pounds) business; Raj Kumar (four mn pounds) business; Rana Talwar (3.2 mn pounds), benefits; Tom Singh (2.87 mn pounds), business, Ranjit Boparan (2.76 mn pounds) business; Baljinder Boparan (2.5 mn pounds), business and A R Rahman (two mn pounds), music.