PISA Music nominees Baluch Twins, Bayaan and Mughal-e-Funk snubbed by event’s organisers

PISA was called out by veteran actors last year who, despite being nominated, were kept in the dark about whether they would even be a part of the show or not.

For this year the same mishap was repeated and Music nominees including Baluch Twins, Bayaan, and Mughal-e-Funk were snubbed by PISA organisers.

The PISA Awards were held in Dubai on November 5 and the Baluch Twins have been nominated by PISA in the Singer Of The Year category alongside Ali Sethi, Aima Baig, Zeeshan Ali, and Sunny Khan Durrani.

Frieha Altaf’s event management company Catwalk was the organizer of this year’s event.

Lyari-based musicians the Baluch Twins took to their official Instagram handle sharing a detailed account of the ordeal they had to go through.

The duo also accused PISA of “discrimination”. Other PISA attendees who were booked on the same flight as the Baluch twins were able to board the plane and leave for Dubai as per schedule. 

Mughal e Funk’s song Sakal Ban was also nominated at PISA, and they also have a similar story to tell.

“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 said while talking to The Express Tribune.

Bayaan who had been nominated in the Song of the Year category for Teri Tasveer also faced similar issues.

Haider Abbas, the bassist for Bayaan told The Express Tribune: “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.”

“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,” he added.

Among the nominations was also the Young Stunners’ collaboration song On and On. However, the rap duo decided not to take part in PISA well ahead of time responding to what happened with Baluch Twins.