Nikita Deb (HINDUSTAN TIMES; February 19, 2020)

The debate about the fairness of award systems in India has existed for as long as the entertainment industry has been around. And recently, after rapper Divine, and Ankur Tewari won the Filmfare award for best lyrics given in the song Apna Time Aayega (Gully Boy; 2019), lyricist Manoj Muntashir took to Twitter to express his disappointment and said that he will not “attend any award show till I breathe my last”.

Manoj, who had written the lyrics for the song Teri Mitti (Kesari; 2019) is upset that his song lost out to what he calls “a song which no parents would like their children to sing”. He clarifies that his problem is not essentially with awards, but with “award shows”. “Award shows are meant to be entertaining and ready to be sold to the highest bidder. Like any other commodity, award shows are designed to create wealth for the organisers. The film industry is still stuck in medieval times. Only an insider can tell you how unequally and heavy-handedly we are treated as opposed to the stars, who are stars because we decorate them with our skills,” says Manoj, adding that he wouldn’t have felt bad if he had lost out to Amitabh Bhattacharya or Irshad Kamil, who were both nominated in the same category. But, when he lost to Gully Boy, he felt like “Lord Krishna who was killed by a hunter”. Manoj adds, “He deserved a better death, and I deserved a better defeat.”

The lyricist remembers first hearing the song Apna Time Aayega when his eight-year-old son was singing it. “My first reaction was that he has learnt this gaali-galauj by staying in the wrong company. I refuse to be judged by the prejudiced minds. Obviously, you can’t make everyone happy, but the least you can do is to not sell your soul. Teri Mitti has become the anthem of our 40 lakh soldiers and paramilitary forces. So, fairness is a no brainer here,” Manoj laments.

The writer, who has also written lyrics of songs such as Galliyan (Ek Villain; 2014) and Kaun Tujhe (M S Dhoni - The Untold Story; 2016) goes on to share that for films and actors, special categories such as critics’ choice and popular choice are invented so as to not miff the actors. He says, “The organisers want to keep as many of them happy as they can. So, why can’t the same rule be applied to music as well? Let’s be fair and have popular and critic categories in music. But they are not interested in wasting time on us. Let’s face it — musicians, writers, technicians, don’t matter [to the organisers]. To them, we are just liabilities. Given a chance, they would stop inviting and honouring us, but traditions can’t be broken easily so they bear us like unwanted guests. It’s high time for us to find our lost self-respect and stop showing up where we aren’t welcome.”

Manoj signs off by saying, “In a few hours, I had an entire nation standing by my side, making me believe that Teri Mitti is beyond awards. Kisi ki jeet se zyada meri haar ke charche hain.”