HYDERABAD: “So you want my entire autobiography?!” exclaims Gudimella Rajashekar, or as Hyderabadis would know him, RJ Shekar Basha.
A welcoming and warm person, Shekar gets nostalgic as we try to find out the journey of this award-winning RJ. We sit down to chat.
Indeed a long story and a long journey, Shekar’s life as he had imagined it as a teenager wasn’t what it turned out today.
“I’m not complaining though,” he immediately clarifies. “As a teenager I was fascinted by films and wanted to work in the film industry. I got in touch with Tollywood director Krishna Vamsi during the first year of Engineering and asked him to have me on his team. He said he already had several assistants and didn’t need one.
After a pause, he asked me what I do and I told him I was a student. He immediately said,’Don’t waste your time,’ and sent me away,” shares Shekar.
The struggle through chances to find space on the silver screen went on for a while. A stroke of destiny landed him a role in a TV show which despite going off-air, got him the visibility to land a place as a video jockey on Gemini’s music channel.
From TV to Radio
As Shekar confesses, he has been active on television as well until as recently as last year.
“I genuinely loved the job and I almost gave up the life-changing opportunity I had gotten then as an RJ at Big FM. I was making ends meet with a VJ gig on Gemini TV and I also worked as an RJ at Red FM which had only just launched back then. These were my bread and butter while I try my luck in cinema. When my show turned into a runaway hit in just a month from my kicking it off, I was thrilled. There were people offering me a job as an RJ. That’s when i realised that RJing could be a career as well. And since then I haven’t looked back,” says Shekar.
What he thinks is his strength is the fact that he is original and doesn’t rely on recreated content. “I wanted to name my show Kevv Keka at my first job but my producer thought it was too crass for a public show. I insisted and he had a meeting with the marketing and branding team and told me that I couldn’t use it for the show but could use it as a tagline. And that turned into a rage. It became a part of local lingo. There weren’t any songs or movies or scenes that used the catchphrase back then; all of them came later. And I’d like to credit myself for creating a catchphrase,” he chuckles.
Who’s listening?
Shekar has an idealistic and at the same time a practical view of what he wants to present to his listeners. “I have a picture of an IT employee in a cab in front of me when I am doing my show,” he says. Now that might sound strange but he has a clever explanation for it. He explains, “I do the prime time show and during that time, the highest percentage of listeners are cab drivers and IT employees. Prime Time is between 8 am to 11 am and 5 pm to 8 pm usually which is when these people are driving between office and home. I keep most of my work targetted towards them.” Shekar Basha also has an ethical side to him. “I make sure that even as a mistake I don’t use certain words that I wouldn’t want impressionable listeners to be exposed to. These may not be expletives. Even words like let’s say “sexy” used commonly in conversation may end up becoming something a child says after listening to us,” he says adding, “I also refrain from pranking or insulting a listener for a few laughs. It’s a complaint I have about most prank shows or a few RJs who talk down to a listener and add laughs in the background to create entertainment. Humour shouldn’t single someone out.”
Marathon man
Every year no matter where he is, Shekar makes sure he picks up a cause to fight for. “You’ll find me at any dharna you might come across in the city,” he jokes. “It is a way to use your influence and the attention you get and redirect it to something important.” His famous credential is the marathon radio shows he hosts each of which have a very specific cause to promote. So far he has hosted four such radio shows each of which average on a 100 hours of RJing!
For the young ones
As an experienced and one of the most popular RJs of the city, Shekar understands the business to notice and advice the younger generation who only see the glitz and glamour of the job. “It takes a lot more than just rambling or a good voice. The person has to be up to date with current affairs, the spontainety to handle unplanned work, contacts with important people in the city, an idea of what happens when and where in the city, a sensitivity to the culture of our city and a lot more,” he explains.
Shekar’s biggest lament is the fact that as a lure to young enthusiasts, training centres have emerged claiming to place them as an RJ and taking money from them. He says, “It helps to have a proper Mass Communication degree. But otherwise if you have the flair just come up to a radio studio and ask for work! Most of us are friendly and accomodative. Be an intern and learn work on the job instead of shelling out money on some unreliable training centre.”
— Srividya Palaparthi
srividya.palaparthi
@newindianexpress.com
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