Once the force behind Pakistani rock band Junoon, Salman Ahmad is now making music as a special UN representative.
Salman Ahmad sounds cheerful on the phone at the time of the interview. "I've just got a preview of Deepak Chopra's film How to Know God," he says. The excitement can be attributed to the fact that his song Ghoom Tana is featured on the original soundtrack. "I share space with Madonna on the album," he says with a laugh. "Didn't think that would ever happen."
Nor would Ahmad have ever thought that some day he would share the stage with Richard Gere, Whoopi Goldberg, Naomi Watts, as he did on June 1 this year. Performing solo at the UN General Assembly, Ahmad even had the opportunity to jam with Wyclef Jean and Angelie Kidjou in the grand finale. "That was a unique and inspiring experience. It's not everyday that you get to perform in front of an audience which includes Hollywood celebrities, rock stars, socialites, Aids activists, UN officials and diplomats," he recalls of the performance at the 25th UNAIDS summit.
Ahmad's association began five years ago when, soon after 9/11, he and Indian band Euphoria took to the stage for the first time after pitching the idea of using music as a medium to communicate to Secretary General Kofi Annan and Under-Secretary General for Communication and Public Information Shashi Tharoor.
Performance at the UN
"They asked me what exactly I meant by that and I just said to them, ?Have a rock concert at the UN'. It sounded so non-UN, but a week later Shashi rung me up to see how we could take it further and we performed on UN Day at the UN," he says.
At a time when the UN's relevance is being questioned, Ahmad says he accepted the organisation's offer because he believes in a vision where all nations are united.
"I think nationalism is an outdated concept for the 21st century. If we're to deal with borderless issues such as HIV/Aids, the war on terror and the impact of the internet on our lives, we have to begin to see ourselves as global citizens. The Earth is one interconnected body and even if one of its limbs is infected it's going to make the entire body sick.
"People like myself, Angelina Jolie, Richard Gere and others are able to be effective only because the UN provides us a platform for our activism," he says.
Ahmad, a Pakistani-American, now lives in a New York suburb, where he grew up and in his new role as a UN special representative, finds himself travelling as much as 18 times a year to the Middle East and South Asia. "I was asked to talk about Aids in Pakistan," he says when asked how exactly the whole activist bit came about. Though he says that even if it wasn't publicly obvious, he always felt for many social issues and the real activism kicked off the day he graduated from medical school and decided to abandon the stethoscope for the guitar.
Ripe opportunity
"It's not like I decide today I'm going to be a musician and then slip into activist mode in eight hours," he says. "The music and activism are a double barrel and it's really a whole parcel." To elaborate, he talks of his tour in the US last year. While on the road, Ahmad suggested to some organisers that the tour would be a ripe opportunity to raise funds for South Asian earthquake victims. "So it's not so much diverting the attention but becoming a part of the music," he says.
As the UNAIDS special representative, he has extended his role and presence to other avenues, such as working on poster campaigns, TV, radio and even using his websites (http://www.junoon.com and http://www.isufirock.com) to reach out to as large an audience as possible.
"It's the best way to clear a room," he says about Aids-speak in Pakistan. However, he adds that it's wrong to restrict the conservatism to Pakistan as the same responses and resistance to talk about sex is apparent in India and Bangladesh as well. "It's definitely a cultural thing and not got to do with any religion," he says.
Ahmad is particularly amazed at the attitude of today's youth. "Their levels of concern are incredible. In my time, it was all about sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll, but now they are a lot more sensible. Kids today are much more clued in on Millennium Goals than anyone else I know. Their problem is that they want to clear so many doubts but can't talk to their parents. That's where role models, such as sportspersons, musicians and actors, come in," he says in defence of celebrity activism.
The association of a celebrity with a certain cause or issue does not, he insists, dilute the impact of the message. "It depends on creating the right environment and I think a big name definitely helps in bringing attention to the issue. The UN stage, for instance, was the perfect platform to voice the concern that HIV/Aids today is a huge global issue which can be tackled only if regions work in harmony with each other," he says.
Ahmad, for his part, creates the "right environment", by screening his music video of a song Alvida. Inspired by the story of Shukriya Gull, a 35-year old HIV positive woman from Lahore, the video lauds her courage in standing up and fighting the discrimination meted out by her community. "I dedicated my performance at the UN to women like Shukriya, who speak for all South Asian women infected by their husbands, but have become symbols of hope by educating the society. Alvida showed the human face of Aids," he says. The video, according to Ahmad, creates the right ambience for dialogue and whenever he's addressing a younger audience, he insists on hearing them.
"I always tell them that I'm not interested in lecturing them but want to hear their questions and thoughts," he says. Considering his position and ability to understand two cultures, two worlds and a major health issue, Ahmad says his experience has showed that "if you're culturally sensitive, people talk to you".
Though he does acknowledge that it is still a pretty daunting task to get people to talk about Aids, even if governments are on his side in the war against the disease. "The governments of India and Pakistan are extremely sensitive to the power of pop culture and its ability to reach out to the world. In today's world, MTV educates more people than MIT," he says.
"It's true that even as there are activists like Shukriya working at awareness efforts, the public still harbours suspicions and doubts, and stigmatises people with HIV/Aids. An actor friend of mine died of Aids, but his family chose not to reveal the cause of death to the public. So a lot of work still needs to be done on the cultural level," he adds.
Global artists
Ahmad's role models are, unsurprisingly, the likes of Bono, John Lennon and Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan. Such is the admiration for the lead man of U2 that Ahmad even has a copy of a letter from Bono posted on his website. "They are truly global artists and have used their music to bring the world together," he says. In his case, Ahmad thinks it's a combination of his music and activism that attracts fans to him. "It's not one or the other. Maybe one arouses curiosity to look into the other aspect of my personality."
This summer too, Ahmad will tour the US and then head off to India at the end of July at the invitation of a radio station. It may be his Aids work and quake fund-raising that got the most headlines, but Ahmad insists that it's his heart that decides which issues and projects he wants to get involved with. And that, he says, is how he agreed to give Deepak Chopra his song Ghoom Tana.
"I've also worked with organisations like the Asia Society, Breakthrough and the US-Islamic Forum to help build peace and understanding between cultures. In September, I'm hosting a Hope Not Hate Summit in Washington DC. It is organised by the Brookings Institution and the Qatar government. It's the fifth anniversary of 9/11 and my aim is to start a dialogue between America and the Muslim world."
"I try to keep a global view of the world. I'm a Pakistani-American and my mother came from Patiala in India. It's always easy when you learn to see with the heart and think beyond borders," he says.
