"Ottagathai Kattiko" is a song

Song

In music, a song is a composition for voice or voices, performed by singing.A song may be accompanied by musical instruments, or it may be unaccompanied, as in the case of a cappella songs...

, featured in the 1993 Tamil film

Kollywood

Kollywood is a word referring two different movie industries in India and Nepal, derived from the word Hollywood and their local movie centers.* Tamil cinema, the Tamil language film industry based on Kodambakkam, Chennai, Tamil Nadu,...

 Gentleman

Gentleman (film)

Gentleman is a 1993 Tamil film directed by S. Shankar, produced K. T. Kunjumon. The film marked S. Shankar's debut in film, and with the highest budget for an Indian film in that year, became a blockbuster upon release. It stars Arjun and Madhoo in the lead roles...

. The song was written by lyricist Vairamuthu

Vairamuthu

Vairamuthu Ramaswamy Thevar is an award-winning Tamil poet and lyricist.Debuting in the film Nizhalgal with the lyrics for the song "Ponmalai Pozhudhu", he has now about 5800 songs to his credit as of January 2009. His partnership with the composers Ilaiyaraaja, and later A. R...

 in the Tamil language

Tamil language

Tamil is a Dravidian language spoken predominantly by Tamil people of the Indian subcontinent. It has official status in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu and in the Indian union territory of Pondicherry. Tamil is also an official language of Sri Lanka and Singapore...

. It was composed by A. R. Rahman

A. R. Rahman

Allah Rakha Rahman is an Indian composer, singer-songwriter, record producer, musician, and philanthropist. Described as the world's most prominent and prolific film composer by Time, his works are notable for integrating eastern classical music with electronic music sounds, world music genres and...

 and sung by S. P. Balasubrahmanyam

S. P. Balasubrahmanyam

Sripathi Panditaradhyula Balasubrahmanyam is a multilingual Indian playback singer, actor, music director, voice actor and a film producer. He is referred to as S. P. B. or Balu by the media. He has won the National Film Award for Best Male Playback Singer six times closely following K. J. Yesudas...

 and S. Janaki

S. Janaki

S. Janaki is an Indian female playback singer. Renowned for her voice modulation abilities, she has sung in many Indian languages, most frequently in Kannada, Malayalam, Tamil, Telugu, and Hindi. Throughout a career spanning more than five decades, she has won four National Film Awards and 35...

.

"Ottagathai Kattiko" is set to the Carnatic rāgam

Carnatic raga

Carnatic rāga refers to rāgas used in Carnatic music. A Carnatic raga has several components - primordial sound , tonal system , pitch , scale, ornaments and important tones.-Janaka ragas :...

 Dharmavati

Dharmavati

Dharmavati is a rāgam in Carnatic music . It is the 59th Melakarta rāgam in the 72 melakarta rāgam system of Carnatic music....

.

This song features the lead pair of the movie Arjun and Madhoo

Madhoo

Madhoo is an actress in Indian films. She has acted in Malayalam, Hindi, Tamil, Telugu and Kannada films. She was named after the late Hindi actress Madhubala. She has acted with almost all leading actors in India...

. The pretense of the song is a dream of Madhoo

Madhoo

Madhoo is an actress in Indian films. She has acted in Malayalam, Hindi, Tamil, Telugu and Kannada films. She was named after the late Hindi actress Madhubala. She has acted with almost all leading actors in India...

, who in her cousin's wedding dreams of Arjun.

The starting lines of the song is similar to a portion of the 1991 song, "Eddem Ante Teddam Antav", composed by Raj-Koti

Raj-Koti

Raj-Koti is a music composer duo of Telugu movies, active during 1980s and 1990s. It consisted of Saluri Koteswara Rao son of veteran music director Saluri Rajeswara Rao and Thotakura Somaraju son of veteran music director T. V. Raju. Later, the two split up and started composing independently...

 and sung by Malgudi Subha

Malgudi Subha

Malgudi Subha is an Indian playback singer. She has recorded songs in Telugu, Tamil, Kannada, Malayalam and Hindi. In a career spanning for two decades, she sang more than 2500 songs....

 from the album Chik Pak Chik Bam. However, it was later clarified that Rahman, who was as an arranger in Raj-Koti's team helped them in composing the original song. It was K. T. Kunjumon, the producer of Gentleman

Gentleman (film)

Gentleman is a 1993 Tamil film directed by S. Shankar, produced K. T. Kunjumon. The film marked S. Shankar's debut in film, and with the highest budget for an Indian film in that year, became a blockbuster upon release. It stars Arjun and Madhoo in the lead roles...

, who insisted Rahman to partially reuse that tune.

It was featured in a BBC fashion runway show. The song was remixed by French rap group La Caution and became a huge underground hit in France and Germany. The resulting remix "Pilotes Automatique" appeared in the film Sheitan

Sheitan

Sheitan is a 2006 French horror film. It was directed by Kim Chapiron, and written by Kim and Christian Chapiron. It stars and was co-produced by Vincent Cassel...

.

The song was also reused by A. R. Rahman in his album Vande Mataram

Vande Mataram (album)

Vande Mataram is a 1997 studio album by Indian musician A. R. Rahman. It is the largest selling Indian non-film album to date. It released on December 9, 1997 by Columbia Records, a music label under Sony Music...

(1998) as "Musafir". This song was sung by Rahman himself, but the instrumentation

Instrumentation (music)

In music, instrumentation refers to the particular combination of musical instruments employed in a composition, and to the properties of those instruments individually...

is completely different.