Opinion Sidhu Moosewala: Carrying culture in his contradictions

A privileged Jatt boy from Punjab who took the familiar route to Canada via an engineering college, one who predictably sang of caste as a matter of pride, of his gun as his beloved, and of having countless enemies, Sidhu’s image and imagination appeared to stand at odds with each other.

While being an internet-driven star of today, he often harked back to an earlier time to make his point. Robin Hood-like folk heroes such as Jeona Morh and Sikh warriors like Mai Bhago made appearances in his imagery.

Much of his appeal was entrenched in these contradictions that made him more believable than his peers, and it helped that he was hardly ever bothered about them. When a controversy broke out about using the name of Mai Bhago in a song describing a righteous woman, he apologised “for hurting some of you”, but added, “Main bahut syana nahin, par tusi vi aavde aap nu bahuta syana na samjho, mere veer (I may not be quite wise but, my brothers, you need not think of yourself as very wise either.)”

This quality to retain his unapologetic persona, even while apologising for a “mistake”, made his fans believe he was never lying to himself or to them. And this placed him somewhere between a popstar and folk icon, between a rebellious truth-teller and a new-age influencer.

His canvas reflected this appeal. He would liberally use English words in his songs – not just brand names or nouns but everyday verbs, adjectives, entire phrases sometimes – yet his singing style would remind you of folk singers such as Kuldeep Manak. His verses in the Punjabi-English lingo spoken on the street would move between geographies too, from the village chhappar (pond) to his Brampton hood, from being the master of the khet (fields) to driving a cab in a foreign country. Even in these English-filled verses, he would lament that kids these days are not taught Punjabi at all. Define language, he could ask if you questioned him.

Even in comparing his life at home and abroad in multiple songs, Sidhu expressed disgust at being racially discriminated against in Canada, yet he continued to sing in praise of caste pride when speaking of Punjab, glamourising a feudal setup. Was he upset at the idea of discrimination, or was he just appalled at being on the wrong side for once? Here again, he reflected the contradiction that is the upper-caste migrant experience in the West.

But it would be dishonest to say that he was unique. The migrant experience, culture shock, and constant glorification of the past have been motifs in Punjabi pop culture the past few years.

Talent and timing work in tandem for stardom. To give his musical prowess its due, he was arguably the first Punjabi artist to fully embrace hip-hop, and not just have a token verse or two in a romantic ballad. At the same time, as Reliance put free “data” in every pocket, Sidhu’s talent was unleashed en masse. His first viral hit, ‘So High’ (2017), made him an overnight star just months after the unlimited-internet revolution.

Unlike the pre-Jio times when TV still held some heft, free or cheap internet expanded the audience and brought it all at one platform. Everyone, even students who earlier had to buy data in MBs, was devouring content by the GBs. Songs were not enough; internet demanded more.

Sidhu was a man of his times, so his life became an extension of his art. The artiste was now a lifestyle — songs, his FB lives, his real-life criminal cases, and the image of a good-hearted rebel. The complete package.

Does that make Sidhu Moosewala a true representative of present-day Punjabi culture then? If one were to imagine culture as a sanitised, no-warts version of how people live, Sidhu would perhaps be something to hide. But those are hardly ever the products that sell in the market of popular memory. Over the past several decades, Punjabi language, customs and many other elements of the region’s culture has got global recognition only because of roaringly popular artistes, particularly singers like Gurdas Maan and Diljit Dosanjh, who too carry contradictions within.

Sidhu Moosewala, thus, remains a true carrier of culture as it’s lived on the street. His unabashed embrace of inherent contradictions in Punjabi society propelled him to cult status. And his death in a hail of bullets – just as he perhaps imagined — will only add to that, no matter where the debate on culture proceeds next.

The writer is a journalist and author who writes on pop culture and society