Behind the veil of the Antilla, the Taj, and the film industry, were the chawls where Naezy grew up. Naved Sheik, or as the world now knows him now-Naezy, remembers the predicaments of growing up in Kurla West or as he likes to call it, Bombay 70. While most of Mumbai was obsessing over Bollywood hip-hop/rap mixes, there were some who were focused on what rap actually represented-the gully. It brought visibility in terms of sponsors, music producers, and people who were looking to capitalise on that.”

Bhanuj Kappal, a music journalist based out of Mumbai believes that “because Badshah and the others were commercially successfully, they created the market for people like DIVINE and Naezy, and got people looking at hip-hop. But whereas in the West, rap went from to protest form to pop music, In India it had an opposite effect.Īlthough popular rap music played no part in influencing the wave of rappers that was to come, it did some good for them in terms of marketing and promotion. Soon, Bollywood appropriated the genre, adopting the music for its dance tracks, commissioning fresh voices and expanding its rapidly increasing marketability. But it was only after the emergence of the likes of Bohemia, Badshah, Hard Kaur, and Yo Yo Honey Singh that every Indian household truly grasped (or they thought they did) what hip-hop and rap was. Simultaneously, the influence of Indian origin UK artists, who were conflating Punjabi music and hip-hop, familiarised Indian audience with the genre. This global popularity birthed ‘ India’s own Vanilla Ice’, Baba Sehgal-deemed by many as the first musician to rap in Hindi. As part of its musical evolution, the art form which originated as an underground movement in Bronx, New York City, eventually found itself at home in clubs around the world. It is normal for a poetic/music form to evolve into new styles and by the mid-2000s, artists such as Eminem, 50 Cent, Jay-Z, and Snoop Dogg had popularised hip-hop music throughout the world. It was only in the late 90s and early 2000s MTV artists swathed the genre with bling-expensive cars, diamonds, champagne, misogyny-wiping away almost everything that hip hop originally stood for. For as long as hip-hop has existed, it has reflected the politics of its community. With artists like Kendrick Lamar, Mos Def, Akala, and Killer Mike in the scene the genre has started going back to its protest roots of empowering marginalised voices owning their truth.

This is a big moment for hip-hop music now.” When Kendrick Lamar won the Pulitzer Prize for his album DAMN (2017) in 2018, journalist, author and administrator of the Pultizer Prize Dana Canedy said, “It shines a light on hip-hop in a completely different way. Manan Kapoor, on how rappers across India are reclaiming hip-hop to tell powerful socio-political narratives that are changing the game of the rap scene in the country.

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