Early Friday afternoon, a video that went viral on Facebook left the showbiz industry, musicians in particular, angry and shocked. The video saw upcoming ghazal singing duo, Baluch Twins sitting in the waiting space of Karachi’s Jinnah International airport detailing how they were not allowed to board the plane taking all the participants and nominees of PISA awards to Dubai for the ceremony that was to be held on Friday evening.
The twins were nominated in the Singer of the Year category for their song Tazn Teehar. The video later on cuts to the Twins in their home where they speak of the unbelievable anguish and pain this experience brought to them and their family and how this unprofessional attitude was nothing but ‘discriminatory’.
Hours later, it turned out that Baluch Twins weren’t alone; they were simply the first nominees to call out the management for their unprofessionalism. Both Bayaan and Mughal-e-Funk, who had been nominated in the Song of the Year category for Teri Tasveer and Sakal Ban respectively also faced similar issues and so did Young Stunners.
Adil Baluch from Baluch Twins spoke to The Express Tribune about how they saw all other celebrities fly out while being informally notified by a Catwalk Events representative of the “cancellation” of the Emirates flight they were meant to board. “After we had the test done, at around 11 at night, Moiz Abbas Rizvi, the coordinator, sent us a regular text, no official statement or anything, saying that they were sad to inform us that our flights had been cancelled by Emirates. We were very confused and couldn’t come to terms with how Emirates could cancel our flight without a valid reason,” Adil said.
When the twins visited the airline’s head office to corroborate this information provided to them, they were shocked to find out they had been snubbed. “The next morning, I went to the head office and they told us no such thing has happened, and that the tickets are booked on the names of me and my brother, and that we are set for departure tomorrow. We were satisfied with their answer but were also concerned about why [PISA] lied to us and gave us this inaccurate statement. We were worried because they kept us engaged for three months and were making such statements at the last minute. Later on, a friend of ours, who is a travel agent, told us that our details weren’t showing, which meant that while the flight hadn’t been cancelled, [PISA] had requested a refund for both of our tickets.”
Next day when they went to the airport they were not issued boarding passes because the tickets had been cancelled and when they took it up with the PISA management, they were told that it was the travel agency’s fault and not their own. When Adil’s brother contacted the travel agent, they said there was no way they’d do anything of the sort on their own all of a sudden, and that they were told to do so.
Following the incident, the twins were made two offers, both of which they rejected on the basis of their absurdity. “We sat there for hours hoping to sort out whatever issue may have happened. At first, [PISA] took a very long time to respond. They asked us how we even managed to get inside, and then they started to blame each other. They gave us two very weird offers. Since they couldn’t put us on the flight going to Dubai that day, the first offer was that four to six months from now, they will arrange a concert for Baluch Twins. The second was that, if we could find a flight to Dubai either tonight or tomorrow morning on our own, then they would pay half the ticket price and the other half would be on us. That’s what they initially said, after which we were stunned. If we were just going to Dubai for fun, we would have arranged everything on our own, but we were nominated.”
The saga continues with Bayaan and Mughal-e-Funk
Like the Baluch Twins, Bayaan members were in touch with PISA for the last couple of months regarding travel documentation and had the same story to tell. “A night before we had to fly out, PISA management informed us that our flight had been cancelled by Emirates. This was a few hours before we had to fly to Karachi for our international flight to Dubai. But we were fine because we knew that flights are being cancelled nationwide. However, when we did our own inquiry, we found out that all the flights were leaving on schedule but our tickets had been refunded by the PISA organisers. All the people who were booked to go for PISA were going; we were in touch with them,” Haider Abbas, the bassist for Bayaan told The Express Tribune.
“So I think this is highly unethical and very unprofessional because if there was an issue, they could have communicated it earlier. If they could only afford to fly out the winners, they could’ve told us that too. We had planned everything accordingly and we were snubbed one night before. When we messaged the guy handling the PISA logistics, he did not get back to us. And when we messaged our point of contact at Catwalk, they told us that it was not on them because the mismanagement was on the end of PISA organisers.”
Haider went on reinstate how, by doing this, PISA has given out a negative message. “They have reiterated that there is a hierarchy and that any artiste who does not fall under the celebrity status or is not top tier, will not be accommodated. It also demotivates aspiring artists who are putting in hours of hard work. It is disrespectful.”
Mohammad Aizaz, who has performed at a number of places with the South-Asian funk fusion Mughal-e-Funk told a similar story. “Mughal e Funk’s song Sakal Ban was nominated at PISA, but the management told us only two members could represent the entire band at the ceremony and that was not acceptable, because it’s not like they sought our permission before using the track for nominations. So we backed out,” Sohail informed The Express Tribune.
“But what happened with Baluch Twins is quite worse, poor boys were devastated. One of them even messaged me, telling me about this entire scenario. I also got to know that Bayaan was refused to board the flight because of ‘flight issues’ as per the organisers. But how did so many celebrities reach and a select few were left behind? Especially two very refined artists, it doesn’t make sense," he remarked.
Not so stunned
Among the nominations was also the Young Stunners’ collaboration song On and On but the rap duo had decided to not take part in PISA well ahead of time. "What has happened with Baluch Twins was quite unfair and unfortunate. We are really sad that happened. But ours is a different story,” Talha Yunus told The Express Tribune. “We had declined to come ourselves because we didn’t like the way PISA organisers approached us. They had started calling us instead of our managers who deal with event planners, organisers on our behalf. They were not interested in speaking to them [our managers]. It was like an intrusion, an invasion of privacy. So we took it upon ourselves to back off, it was our decision. And after what happened to Baluch Twins, we felt artists are being disrespected. Because if you’re rebooking everyone else’s tickets, if they’re able to board their flights, then Baluch Twins shouldn’t have been left out.”
PISA’s failed negotiations, T20 world cup, Dubai expo
Although PISA hasn’t formally given a statement in response to these allegations of mismanagement and discrimination, a representative spoke to The Express Tribune shortly after the Baluch Twins raised their concerns on social media.
“Baluch Twins were among the first 40 people we had booked tickets for. Then suddenly, 27 of our flights had been cancelled from Lahore. Among these we also had flights of Ahmed Ali and our whole schedule was affected. Then because of the ongoing cricket world cup and Expo, ticket prices surged overnight,” Project Head PISA, Waqas Rizvi told The Express Tribune in Dubai.
“And any event has its budget, its limitations. I don’t own the Awards so I was also answerable. Emirates gave us an alternative but asked us to pay 20% extra. Following this, we had to rebook several domestic and international flights. Then two of our flights got cancelled from Islamabad, including Arsalan Nasir’s. Then we wrote a letter to the agents (Gerry’s) who coordinated with the airlines. We had an addition of 12-15 people who we had to fly out in business class. They were VVIP and this made our budget exceed by 30%,” said Rizvi.
He further elaborated that in Dubai there’s also been a new tax which compels you to pay 40,000 AED before the show, something that Faisal Khan, PISA Founder and CEO of Mesmerize PR, the company responsible for coordinating visas, flights and accommodations in Dubai, was not aware of.
“Then when we received a time limit from the airline for 11 tickets, which required us to make payments as soon as possible and since we couldn’t pay on time, they cancelled the flights. The same tickets that we had booked for Rs70,000 were now costing us Rs180,000. So Baluch Twins’ flight was also cancelled. Then I spoke to Baluch Twins 4-5 times over the phone, I told them, ‘Listen, do what you think is right. My budget allows me to spend Rs100,000 right now and I am willing to pay Rs50,000 on top of that.’ Then they sent me a couple of flight options. But I told them I was caught up in handling the tickets and arrivals of so many people, and I had to explain to so many people like children what to do,” he said.
“Then Baluch Twins called back saying the ticket was costing them Rs180,000. I told them ‘I have this much cash on me right now. I can give it and the rest you can add on and take a flight so you can at least come here. I can reimburse you after. Because even Sajjad Ali was reimbursed today, I couldn’t get Ali Azmat a flight of his choice so he booked it himself and came here.’ Then moments later they called me saying, ‘we didn’t get any flight and we know you pulled this off with us because we’re Baloch.’ I told them that’s nonsense, because PISA is the only award show that promotes digital celebrities as well as artists otherwise. The rest of the awards don’t do that. Awards otherwise only invite a limited number of people to save their money and space but we are inclusive. The Baluch Twins, however, continued to threaten us and I told them my offer was still valid.”
After listening to Rizvi’s claim, Adil said that no one from his team ever threatened anyone but yes they did say they felt discriminated. “Since all the celebs, and in some cases even their siblings were also flying out, it was only natural for us to assume and say that perhaps we were being sidelined because we are Baloch or belonged to an underprivileged neighbourhood like Lyari. No one threatened them. That’s absolutely wrong. They are picking out one word from our statement and hiding behind that. Our question was and continues to be: why were we left behind? And we still don't have an answer for that.”
A botched history
Last year, PISA was called out by veteran actors who, despite being nominated, were kept in the dark about whether they would even be a part of the show. Bulbulay star Nabeel Zafar had lashed out at the organisers on social media for using his name for promotions but failed to make travel arrangements. Nadia Afgan, who was nominated for her outstanding performance in a comedy role in Suno Chanda faced a similar issue. Adnan Shah Tipu, who was also nominated for the same serial, noted that around 40 people, including him, had been snubbed by the Awards. "Nabeel, Rehan and Hina Dilpazeer, the same happened with all of them. They were all nominated but didn't receive the tickets, yet their name was used for promotions," Tipu told The Express Tribune. Actor Osman Khalid Butt in a Twitter post revealed that he, along with Ahmed Ali Akber and Saqib Malik, were also ditched by PISA last minute.
In response to the outrage, PISA’s then PR representative, Body Beat’s CEO Hasan Rizvi apologised for the whole ordeal.
Even this time around, Butt took to social media and commented under the Baluch Twins video that: “This is unacceptable - ACT's council members will be investigating this as well as the UMAP.”
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