Revanth winner of Indian Idol 9
Indian Idol 9 winner Revanth with Sachin TendulkarTwitter

LV Revanth has been crowned the winner of Indian Idol 9. The grand finale of the popular singing reality show was held on Sunday, April 2. Revanth, who hails from Hyderabad, won prize money of Rs 25 lakh and a singing contract with Universal Music.

Revanth was pitted against PVNS Rohit and Khuda Baksh in the final round to win the title. All the finalists delivered terrific performances, but it was Revanth who, with his power-packed performance, emerged as the winner. Sachin Tendulkar, who was the special guest on the finale, handed over the trophy to Revanth. 

Revanth is an established singer in Telugu and Kannada films. He has sung around 200 songs and has won several awards. Not just that, he had even lent his voice in Baahubali: The Beginning. Talking about his plan to venture into Bollywood, Revanth said that he wishes to sing Bollywood songs. "I will go back home and celebrate with my friends and family who supported me, but I will come back to Bollywood and settle here," Hindustan Times quoted him saying.

Initially, Revanth's struggle with the Hindi language was considered a drawback on the show but with constant hard work, he managed to overcome the obstacle and won the audience's hearts.

Judges Anu Malik, Farah Khan and Sonu Nigam were also all praise for the winner. Anu told Bollywood Life: "We have picked up them also. And the rationale is that yeh manch nahi yeh rishta hai jo bharat ko bharat se jodta hai, you would have heard these lines. Till date, we have never got any South Indian singer Go back to Indian Idol's previous seasons, we never got. This season, if we would have want, we could have avoided because they don't speak our language.

"The unique part of this boy was he couldn't speak Hindi but when he started singing in Hindi, I, Sonu and Farah looked at each other. We weren't told earlier that he is from South, he came and told us that he has already sung. Personally as a judge and even for Sonu and Farah, we didn't want to miss this singer because he hasn't sung any Hindi song, he doesn't know Hindi language, he can't speak it but he sings well. If he would have sung Hindi songs earlier then maybe I would have said that you have got the experience."