Three Pakistanis make it to 'Forbes'

Abdullah Siddiqui is the latest Pakistani to have made it to the Forbes 30 under 30 list. The young musician, who has produced three albums so far, has been lauded by fans and peers over the honour. Siddiqui took to Instagram and shared the news in a post. "Forbes 30 Under 30. I’m completely stunned and so incredibly grateful," the Resistance singer penned, adding, "To everyone who helped me get here, thank you."

The publication said of the singer, "Siddiqui began producing English-language electronic music at the age of 11 and started releasing it as an independent artist when he was 16."

It further added, "The native of Lahore has appeared on Nescafé Basement, a Pakistani TV series that showcases the music of underground artists. He has written and produced music for some prominent singers in Pakistan, including Fawad Khan, Meesha Shafi, Shamoon Ismail and Aima Baig."

Soon after the news broke, Meesha Shafi, Ushna Shah, Abdullah Qureshi, Ayesha Omar, Natasha Baig and others congratulated Siddiqui on the well-deserved appreciation.

"Could’ve been on ‘20 under 20’ but they slow," wrote Shafi on Siddiqui's Insta post while Shah added, "I wanna say I called it but like.. everyone called it."

Siddiqui essentially rose to fame when his original track Resistance was featured on season five of Nescafe Basement. Produced and revamped by the maestro Xulfi himself, the youngster seemed content with the latest version of his popular track. But Nescafe Basement was just the beginning. Earlier this year, Siddiqui released his third studio album, dead Beat poets, something he says is an ode to the romanticisation of today’s youth.

Other than Siddiqui, two more Pakistanis made it to Forbes 30 Under 30. Artist Misha Japanwala and the government official Hannia Zia, too, were mentioned in the list. Talking of Japanwala's art, the publication shared, "Japanwala is a visual artist and designer whose work addresses issues such as domestic violence and honor killings in Pakistan. She collaborated with Gigi Hadid last year on a sculptural mask for a special issue of V Magazine that the supermodel guest-edited."

It further read, "Another of Japanwala's works, a collection of breastplates and other wearable body castings, was featured in a six-page spread in Vogue Spain in 2018, modeled by French model Cindy Bruna."

Speaking of Zia, the outlet shared, "Zia is the Pakistani Government's sole product manager of its pandemic tech response and one of the three founding members of the Prime Minister's Office initiative Digital Pakistan. She launched a WhatsApp bot to spread Covid-19 awareness in seven local languages that has connected to 500,000 users and was endorsed by Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg, as well as a Covid-19 ringtone, which has been heard by 113 million Pakistanis."

It also said, "Zia also grew the Health Ministry's Facebook page a hundred-fold to 1.8 million followers. Prime Minister Imran Khan recognized her for her contributions with a WHENTK award. A former Google product manager with several patents under her name, Zia studied computer science and psychology at Yale."

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