Pakistani musician Rahat Fateh Ali Khan’s video apology on social media, after he was seen hitting a man with his slipper in a viral clip, has not convinced singer Chinmayi Sripada of his innocence. 

According to Sripada, the victim, Naveed Hasnain, reportedly Khan’s disciple, should not have accepted the oppression. “In the guru-shishya parampara, a lot of us are brainwashed into yes-manning whatever our guru says. Until we cultivate a worldview, we don’t realise that a lot of what our gurus have been doing is toxic,” she tells us. 

In the viral CCTV footage, Khan is seen beating his student while asking for a “bottle”. Explaining the situation in his video, the musician said the bottle had holy water and it was a “personal matter between an ustad and his shagird”. 

Sripada, who slammed Khan’s actions on X, feels the students submit because they are conditioned to think that speaking against their teacher is a huge crime. She also says “this sort of physical violence is not new”. “I’m glad this (video) came out because the kind of abuse that men and women go through under their gurus has never been documented,” she adds. 

The 39-year-old believes that in India, people just forgive and forget, especially fans, who “blindly worship them (the celebs)”.

The Mast Magan (2 States, 2014) hitmaker feels speaking against such offences comes with a cost, something she has faced personally. “There are risks involved when you speak the truth. I have faced a ‘work ban’ by the Tamil film industry, and I’ve been going to court for the past five-and-a-half years for this,” she ends.