Currently in the British leg of his world tour, singer and musician Adnan Sami is amused by reports in India that he had decided to shed weight at his concert colleague Amisha Patel's insistence.

"Amisha is a friend and she's with me on this concert tour. She's a lovely girl. But she isn't my dietician. Yes, I've decided to lose weight. It has been weighing heavily on my mind - and other places, ha ha - for quite some time," Sami told IANS.

"Close friends and well-wishers have expressed concern. In fact a journalist-friend made bold to ask me how my voice doesn't get breathless and wheezy. All I'll say is it's god's benevolence. My voice is entirely his gift. And I can no longer endanger it. Hence the decision to shed the kilos."

Adnan reveals that he used to be ultra-slim at one time. "But certain emotional disturbances in my life a few years ago forced me to become a voracious eater. Once I started it was impossible to control my weight."

He was referring to his messy divorce with Pakistani actress Zeba Bakhtiar and the ensuing custody battle for their son.

"But now all that is behind me. I'm going through great times. My world tour is an unqualified success. After the US and Canada, I'm now in Britain. At Birmingham, Manchester and Leicester we were sold out.

"At Leicester, fans who couldn't get into the stadium demanded the gates of the stadium should be kept open so that they could hear me singing while standing outside. We obliged of course. It was a very cute situation."

Ecstatic by the response, Adnan continues: "I had one date at the Wembley Stadium. Tickets for that were sold out in two days. I had to do an additional concert on the following day. Both the days I performed in a daze to a sell-out audience. What a dream come true!

"During my last British tour, I was honoured at Wembley for becoming the first Asian performer to perform to sell-out crowds on two consecutive nights. By god's grace, I've now performed the same feat again. What more could I ask for?"