Mumbai: The All India Cine Workers Association (AICWA) has condemned the organisers of Bollywood Music Project after playback singer Shilpa Rao’s set at the festival’s 10th anniversary edition was cut short on 24 October. The association, which described Rao as a National Award-winning singer, said her microphone and stage lights were switched off while she was performing.
What happened on stage
Rao remained on stage for some time after the sound was cut, the AICWA said, before Kutle Khan of the Kutle Khan Project began singing in her place. The body called the sequence “completely unacceptable” and said forcibly cutting a performing artist’s sound and lighting mid-show, then handing the stage to another act, cannot be justified.
On Instagram, Rao wrote that “a piece of my heart broke tonight,” but added that the Mumbai crowd kept calling her name after the music stopped. She promised to return to the city.
Why the industry body stepped in
Live festival schedules are tight, but the visible manner of this shutdown turned a scheduling problem into an artist-dignity dispute. By treating the incident as a workers’ rights matter, the AICWA has framed mid-performance shutdowns as a question of professional treatment, not merely a production inconvenience.
Bollywood playback voices have become festival headliners in their own right as film music travels beyond cinema halls to ticketed live events. When a singer is billed as a performer, the audience pays for the promise of a complete set; cutting it short without visible communication breaks the compact with the audience as much as with the artist.
BMP’s response
Bollywood Music Project later apologised on Instagram, saying it holds Rao in high regard and regretted the “abrupt conclusion” of her performance. The organisers pointed to compounding delays and the operational realities of large-scale, multi-artist festivals, adding that the circumstances were out of their control.
An apology is useful, but it rarely undoes the image of a singer left on a darkened stage. The episode is also a reminder that Hindi cinema’s live circuit now runs under phone cameras: a single clip can travel faster than a statement, so operational failures carry reputational risk far beyond the venue.
What festival teams can take from this:
- Build buffer time between sets so one delay does not eat into the next act.
- Brief an artist’s team before any stage transition, especially if a set must be shortened.
- Protect headline performers’ slots even when earlier sets run late.
Source: The Hollywood Reporter India
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