It is ‘Praagaash’ II ahead of Zubin Mehta concert in the Valley. Seven months after all-girls rock band ‘Praagaash’ was forced to disband, the lone disk jockey (DJ) of the Kashmir Valley Athar Iqbal Mir aka DJ Aki has become the newest victim of the online abuses and threat calls.
DJ Aki has withdrawn into a shell after receiving threat calls warning him of dire consequences if he does not quit music.
Shell-shocked, he has filed a complaint in the cyber police station which has now asked the “DO (duty officer) Channapora to initiate legal action”. “I have lodged a complaint after I received phone call from an unknown number on Sunday evening. The caller asked me to quit or face the music. I was so frightened that I left my home to stay with myfriend”, DJ Aki told dna.
DJ Aki is currently working on the first hip-hop remix album of the Kashmiri songs which will hit the market soon. The first of the six songs `Yar Chum’ is creating quite a buzz in the musical circles in the Kashmir valley. DJ Aki is also planning to perform in several cities in the winters to showcase his music.
“It started with a spring festival held in Srinagar some months ago. When I was performing a man from audience asked me to play some song. I refused because there was azan going on in the mosque. Later he came to me and said after Praagaash it is your turn. I took it easy then,” said DJ Aki.
Later the anger spilled on the social networking sites with online abusers posting hate and nasty messages.
“Whenever I updated my status, some people used to post abusive comments. So I started blocking them. But I was really scared when I started receiving threatening phones calls,” he said.
DJ Aki’s case is similar to Praagaash — the three-member girls rock band comprising drummer Farah Deeba, bass player Aneeqa Khalid and, guitarist and vocalist Noma Nazir which was disbanded in February after Grand Mufti of Kashmir Bashir-ud-din issued a fatwa calling music unIslamic. Earlier the girls had gone underground after online moral police brigade posted abuses and threats on a social networking site.
The threat calls comes days before Zubin Mehta’s concert at historic Shalimar garden in Srinagar on Saturday. The show has created a major controversy with Hurriyat hawk Syed Ali Shah Geelani calling for Kashmir bandh and civil society groups planning to hold a counter musical show in Srinagar.
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