Saregama

EMI

In 1901, the company began operations by recording the first song in India, as the first overseas branch of Electric & Musical Industries Limited, EMI London. It was incorporated in Calcutta as The Gramophone and Typewriter Ltd. The following year, Gramophone inventor Emile Berliner's assistant Fred Gaisberg came to India "on a mission to capture music". Gauhar Jaan became the first Indian artist to be recorded there, on 5 January 1902. In 1907, a record factory was started in Dum Dum in Calcutta, the first outside UK.On 13 August 1946, it was incorporated as a Private Limited company with the name of ‘The Gramophone Co. Limited'. It was converted into a public company on 28 October 1968 and consequently the name of the company was changed to ‘The Gramophone Company of India Limited'. RPG Group took over the company in 1985 from EMI when the company's financial health was poor. The name of the company was then changed from The Gramophone Company of India Limited to its current name, Saregama India Limited, on 3 November 2000. In 2005, the remaining EMI stake was sold off to the parent company.

HMV

For the first 100 years, the company retailed its products under the brand name HMV which was synonymous with film music in India. From 2000 onwards, it started retailing its products under the brand name, Saregama.

Dum Dum Recording Studio

Saregama's recording studio, called Dum Dum studio, was built in 1928 in Calcutta. It is one of the oldest studios in Southeast Asia. Nobel Laureate Rabindranath Tagore had recorded his songs and poems in his own voice at this studio. Rebel poet Kazi Nazrul Islam's voice was also recorded here. The Dum Dum Recording studio was also a house to manufacturing and production of Gramophone Records and thereafter Music Cassettes. With advent of digital formats, the physical formats progressively went out of consumer patronage and consequently, these manufacturing facilities

were shut down.