मरहम (पहले भी मैं)

Marham (Pehle Bhi Main) is a standalone reprise/alternate-lyrics version of Animal's runaway hit ballad Pehle Bhi Main, sung and composed by Vishal Mishra with lyrics by Raj Shekhar. Where the original film version (also picturized on Ranbir Kapoor and Tripti Dimri) built its hook around the line 'pehle bhi main tumse mila hoon, pehli dafa mein tujhko dekhoon' (a déjà-vu sense of eternal, past-life familiarity), this version reframes the same tune and situation around the word 'marham' — balm — casting the beloved's touch itself as the healing agent. Released as a promotional single on 23 December 2023 by T-Series, three weeks after Animal's theatrical release and the massive success of the original track, it was folded into the film's official deluxe soundtrack edition in January 2024, though its own standalone release predates that by a month.

Vishal Mishra retains the same tender, piano-and-strings-led melodic architecture of the original Pehle Bhi Main — a slow-build romantic ballad in his signature register (echoing his earlier hits like Kaise Hua and Kabhi Saamne) — while shifting the emotional emphasis of the vocal delivery toward warmth and reassurance rather than the original's wistful longing, matching the 'balm on a wound' imagery of the rewritten lyric.

Raj Shekhar's rewritten lyric keeps the original's core conceit — a love that feels pre-destined, recognised rather than newly found — but replaces its central metaphor with 'marham,' turning the beloved's presence into medicine for unspoken past hurt. The word choice keeps the song in the same Hindi-Urdu poetic register as the original while giving fans a fresh emotional angle on a melody they already knew by heart.

Animal (2023), Sandeep Reddy Vanga's blood-soaked family-revenge saga starring Ranbir Kapoor, Anil Kapoor, Bobby Deol, Rashmika Mandanna and Tripti Dimri, released theatrically on 1 December 2023 and became one of the year's biggest box-office hits despite (and partly because of) intense controversy over its violence and gender politics. Amid the film's brutality, Pehle Bhi Main became its emotional counterweight — a tender Ranbir-Tripti romance theme that went viral independently of the film. Marham (Pehle Bhi Main), released as a separate single three weeks after the film's release, capitalised on that standalone popularity, giving Vishal Mishra fans a companion piece built on the same emotional core without needing new film footage of its own.

While the original Pehle Bhi Main became one of 2023's most streamed and covered Hindi ballads, the Marham reprise remains a comparatively lower-profile companion release — popular chiefly among dedicated fans of the song and of Vishal Mishra, and later absorbed into Animal's official deluxe album in January 2024 alongside other post-release additions like Satranga (Stripped) and Papa Meri Jaan (Child's Version).