Indian Rock

India, in the 1950s and 1960s, had a record industry in the Gramophone Company of India (an EMI subsidiary), and LPs, EPs, and 45rpm records were freely available, including those of rock and roll acts from the US and Britain, but also of contemporary pioneering Indian rock bands. The president of the firm, Bhaskar Menon (who later became the President of Capitol Records in the United States) was the leading promoter of Western pop music in India. Later in 1970, Polydor, the German Label, began an India-based branch that distributed rock music locally. Of these mid-1960s to early 70s beat groups, as they were then termed, some of the most notable were the Mystiks from Bombay, the Beat-X…