Saturday, July 04, 2015

This Tamil rap group challenging corruption and inequality in India...

Suresh Agalian Bose was sitting at the entrance of a fair near a railway station in eastern Mumbai, under an enormous watercolor cutout of a Hindu celestial nymph. It would be another hour before the fairgrounds would open, when grown adults would tumble inside the cars of a Ferris wheel like clothes in a washing machine, couples would aim their air-guns at balloon arrangements, and the pong of marijuana coming from the magic tricks counter would eventually dissipate into the smell of sweat.

Bose was sitting here, lamenting the depravation of Indian society: violence against women, classism, youth unemployment, terrorism, sectarian conflict, and misinterpretation of hip-hop culture.

And yet, Bose had brought me to the fairgrounds because it somehow summed up what he wanted to convey about himself and his work: "We start our day with the problems we carry on our backs. But we are here in this carnival 'cause you should feel free to connect and get happy whenever you can."

Bose, who goes by the names Sean YKV, Slimstyler Sean, and Seansta, is the founder of South Dandies Swaraj, a Tamil-Hindi-English hip-hop group of three men who were raised in families that moved to Mumbai from the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu. These families had come in search of the economic promise of a city giddy with circulating money, but disappointed by the limited opportunities in Mumbai, they improvised to meet whatever jobs they could find. Full story...

Related posts:
  1. Meet the musicians challenging India's rising inequality and untouchability...
  2. India's low-caste Dalits become video journalists to highlight their plight...
  3. The evolution of... M.I.A
  4. Songs of Innocence: scenes from an orphanage in Tamil Nadu...
  5. Tamil kids rapping in Santhome, Chennai...

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