Although playback singer-music director Sonu Nigam is no stranger to controversies, he continues to enjoy a massive fanbase, thanks to the many evergreen tracks he has gifted to listeners over the years. However, he recently paid a hefty price for a controversy he stirred up about eight years ago when he made certain remarks about the azaan (the Islamic call to prayer), as his first concert in Srinagar, Jammu and Kashmir, reportedly witnessed a very low turnout. Meanwhile, a video from the occasion has also gone viral on social media, showing Sonu halting his concert midway to honour the azaan.
In the clip that has since gone viral, Sonu Singam can be seen pausing his performance and saying, “Please give me two minutes; the azaan is about to begin here.” His words were met with cheers and applause from the audience as a token of appreciation for respecting the custom. Once the azaan concluded, Sonu resumed his concert and continued to entertain the attendees.
While his gesture received praise from various quarters on social media, the concert held at the SK International Conference Centre (SKICC) near Dal Lake in Srinagar also made headlines for the unfortunate reason of witnessing a very low turnout. According to Deccan Herald, calls for a boycott of the event likely affected attendance, as many seats were vacant during the show. “There was expectation that it would be house full, but most of the chairs were empty,” a Srinagar resident told the publication.
The controversy mentioned above erupted in 2017 when Sonu Nigam shared a series of tweets condemning the practice of reciting azaan via loudspeakers. He even went as far as to describe it as “forced religiousness” and “gundagardi (gangsterism).” In his first tweet, he wrote, “God bless everyone. I’m not a Muslim, and I have to be woken up by the azaan in the morning. When will this forced religiousness end in India?”
In subsequent posts, he added, “And by the way, Mohammed did not have electricity when he made Islam. Why do I have to have this cacophony after Edison? I don’t believe in any temple or gurudwara using electricity to wake up people who don’t follow the religion. Why then..? Honest? True? Gundagardi hai bus.”
The tweets had resurfaced online recently, attracting a fresh wave of criticism against Sonu Nigam, prompting calls for a boycott of his Srinagar concert. It appears that the tweets are no longer on the singer’s X (formerly Twitter) timeline.
