Rahmatullah with her brother Zafar Iqbal in the 1960s.
Rahmatullah was born on 2 January 1952 as Shahnaz Begum in Dhaka to M Fazlul Haq and Asiya Haq.[7] Actor Zafar Iqbal and music director Anwar Parvez were Rahmatullah's brothers.[3][8] She got trained by ghazal maestro Mehedi Hassan, Ustad Phul Mohammad, Ustad Munir Hossain and Altaf Mahmud.
Rahmatullah was married to Maj (retd) Abul Bashar Rahmatullah.[9]
Career
Rahmatullah debuted in singing at the age of 11, as a playback singer for the film Notun Sur (1963).[10][11] She first performed on television in 1964.[11] She sang in Bangladeshi and Pakistani films.[12] She mostly sang modern (Adhunik Gaan) and patriotic songs. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, she sang patriotic songs such as Sohni Dharti Allah Rakhe and Jeevay Jeevay Pakistan.[13][14] She released an album with Samina Chowdhury called Megh Roddur on which she sang six songs composed by Shafiq Tuhin.[15] She released four albums in total.[10]
Four of Rahmatullah's songs were selected in a BBC survey of 20 greatest Bangla songs of all times.[10]
Rahmatullah died on 23 March 2019 of a heart attack at her residence in Baridhara, aged 67.[11]
Pakistani journalist, Hamid Mir said, "Shahnaz Begum passed away in Bangladesh on March 23 when many Pakistanis were listening to her famous song Sohni Dharti Allah Rakhay on Pakistan day."[10]
