Raja Hasan to anchor Saregamapa Middle East-Pakistan 2008

Posted in Bollywood Music, Saregamapa Middle East-Pakistan, Mentors, Other singers, Raja Hasan, SaReGaMaPa, Uncategorized on March 13th, 2008

raja-srgmp-middle-east-hostJust as we were wondering on why the Zee network has a sudden change of heart in projecting Raja in the past few days - we finally have the answer.

Real Media Corp, the regional arm of Zee Network and Essel Group in the Middle East has confirmed on its website that Raja Hasan will be the host of the Season 3 of Saregamapa Middle East-Pakistan 2008.

In fact Raja Hasan has already left for Dubai for the show has been confirmed by Avtansh, a Bikaner based fan, close to Raja.

So, what’s the Saregamapa Middle East-Pakistan 2008 all about? It’s pretty similar to what we saw in the Saregamapa Challenge 2007 - except for the fact that the contestants are limited to countries in the Middle East and Pakistan. It was the very competition that Amanat Ali won last time. But the standard of the competition is pretty high - with the last season seeing singers like Amanat, Junaid Sheikh, Wasi Effandi and Sikander Ali. All of these who were spotted in the vishwayudh. No news yet on who the judges are, but last season had leading names like Alka Yagnik, Bappi Lahiri, Ismail Durbar, Remo Fernandes, Vasundhara Das and noted Sitar mastreo Nafis Ahmed.

Back to Raja. Now, why was he Zee’s first choice? He’s under their contract - that’s reason #1. But, Raja seems a perfect choice. His singing abilities and fan base is amazing. It automatically builds an audience. But he also is soft-spoken, at times witty, diplomatic, calm, composed and knows how to diffuse the toughest of situations using just his charismatic smile as a weapon. Plus, he is very well versed with Urdu, the language which could be dominant on the show.

Is it a good career move? In terms of exposure and media attention, certainly yes. But there are two things that bother me. One, is the opportunity to pitch for more playback singing offers back in Mumbai that might have to be given up for a couple of months. And two, he’ll have to be part of the fake dramas that Zee’s reality shows are infamous for.

But, these are minor itches. It still is a big opportunity to consolidate his fan base in the Middle East.

As for Raja fans in the Middle east, the shows begin from 21st March, every Friday at 7.30.p.m., local time. Voting will be available from Bahrain, Iraq, Jordan, KSA, Kuwait, Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, UAE and Yemen. The shows will be available in the Middle East, Pakistan and Northern Africa. Unfortunately, the shows will not be available to viewers in India or Northern America.

More updates, as we get them. Meanwhile, enjoy the moment!

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39 Responses to “Raja Hasan to anchor Saregamapa Middle East-Pakistan 2008”

  1. Raffu, on March 13th, 2008 at 11:23 pm Said:

    awesome news……….. Manish thanks a zillion!!
    Raja jaani… wishing you the best of best in this anchoring… i am pretty sure you will do an awesome job and not just awesome job but u will be the hottest, coolest and the awesomest anchor SRGMP ever have seen in its history.
    Loads of love to you today and always!!
    Chak de phatte!!
    :D :D

  2. Aseel, on March 14th, 2008 at 12:11 am Said:

    Thanks for the news
    i’m from Dubai but the show will be in Dubai right ?

  3. RajaHasanBacker, on March 14th, 2008 at 12:35 am Said:

    @Aseel, Dubai is in the UAE right? So you should be getting the show as well as voting abilities. The show will be shot somewhere in the media city.

  4. Imran, on March 14th, 2008 at 1:57 am Said:

    plz teel us timing in KSA.

  5. RajaHasanBacker, on March 14th, 2008 at 2:07 am Said:

    @Imran - I think it would be 7.30 p.m. Dubai time. You would need to calculate your individual time zones based on it.

  6. Kishanraj, on March 14th, 2008 at 2:36 am Said:

    Good news. I wish we can watch in USA.

  7. faida123, on March 14th, 2008 at 2:53 am Said:

    if any of you guys watch the raja on the show please updatte it for us please we cant see it because we are in america , and raja fans in india cant watch it either. please you duys update it hear.

  8. Aseel, on March 14th, 2008 at 3:31 am Said:

    @RajaHasanBacker, then i will definitely go to Media City to meet Raja :))

  9. mmao, on March 14th, 2008 at 4:43 am Said:

    manishwa hum shor machayein toh shayed hum ko bhi dekhney ko mele what say we start bombarding zee with requests

  10. raja_lover28, on March 14th, 2008 at 5:12 am Said:

    Thnx a bunch Manish Bhai for this wonderful news….
    by reading this…u have just made my day….thnx….
    I am sure that Raja will rock the show…I wish him alll the best…
    And yeah to the members who are in UAE…plz some how try to put the videos of the show on youtube or here…coz I, I mean we alll wannna see Raja…plz…plz…plz…
    Raja I love you a lot…and I wish you all the best….I am sure you will break the records…coz u r totally awesome….actually i don’t have words to explain what you really are to me….
    LOVE YOU RAJA :x

  11. raja_lover28, on March 14th, 2008 at 5:13 am Said:

    wait…tht was suppose to be a smiley face….damn….
    :)

  12. Simran, on March 14th, 2008 at 5:51 am Said:

    anyone who is able to watch it, do you think u can record it and post it on the site so that the rest of us can see our Raja as well?

    I do think this is a great opportunity however WHY NOT IN INDIA? Im a little disapointed that hes leavin india to do this but i do think this will give him great exposure and will help further his career.

    Raja, Maybe I WILL SEE U IN DUBAI? =)

  13. sweny, on March 14th, 2008 at 9:34 am Said:

    wow!!! i hope he one day gets to host saregamapa challenge whatever year. Not just for my utter love for saregamapa (uhm) but because the anchors usually end up in pretty good position afterwards… hopefully, raja will reach those heights! :D

  14. priya, on March 14th, 2008 at 10:19 am Said:

    thanks RHB for this wonderful news !!!!!
    I

  15. perdaisydeewani, on March 14th, 2008 at 10:24 am Said:

    Thats A really good news.I am so happy for raja.
    And wish him all the best

    (u R saying these shows will B available In Pakistan.I’ll B thankfull to U if tell me about the chanel.)

  16. banjaaran, on March 14th, 2008 at 11:09 am Said:

    Good Luck Raja. I’m sure your stint as an anchor will be a success!

  17. kavitha, on March 14th, 2008 at 11:17 am Said:

    Uh oh…I am not sure this is what Raja needed at this point in his career…

    as you rightly point out Manish, Raja needs to be here in Bollywood grabbing playback offers rather than hosting the show …

    I am worried too…but all my hopes rest on his De taali becoming a huge, huge hit after which offers will chase him …amen

  18. Rajyashree, on March 14th, 2008 at 2:25 pm Said:

    thank you RHB.its a great news.Raja all the best & i know you will do the anchoring very well.So Raja i love you a lot & break all the records.GOOD LUCK!!!!

  19. Subhadra, on March 14th, 2008 at 5:25 pm Said:

    I am not too happy that Raaja will be in the middle east. Same thing happened to Vinit after challenge 2005 and he is yet to make an established singer in Bollywood. Hope History does not repeat.

  20. RajaHasanBacker, on March 14th, 2008 at 6:48 pm Said:

    Vinit Singh played host in the 2006 series. It was possibly called the Saregamapa Middle east Muqabla 2006. People say, it was a hurriedly put up show with terrible production values - it was shot witin a week and had Himesh, Kumar Sanu and Jatin as judges. And not many people even remember that series. This was followed by the 2007 series, which was a lot more grander in scale - which had the likes of Amanat, Junaid, Wasi and Sikander participating. Vishwas Rai - of EMET fame (Twinkle Bajpai’s partner) had hosted the show and did a pretty good job. But yes, both Vinit and Vishwas are nowhere to be seen in the playback singing scene.

  21. Subhadra, on March 14th, 2008 at 8:18 pm Said:

    That is what I am afraid of when Zee TV is involved. They should give Raaja a permanent Job if they are going to take him away from play back singing. Any way, here in US they are advertising for Challenge 2008 selection in for four cities - Chicago, New York, LA etc., I don’t know whether they will select one candidate to go to Bombay or just contest here.

    I

  22. Sudha, on March 14th, 2008 at 8:36 pm Said:

    I am excited to hear this but at the sametime not.
    First of all he should have taken something that whole of India is able to watch him.
    Middleeast is a very small audience and if they are telecasting in Zee Middleeast channel again the audience is very much nawrrowed down as most of us here are having other connections which does not telecast Zee Middleast same with my friends in Dubai and Abu Dhabi.

    I hope Raja’s fans is Dubai who getting the connection will be able to record the program and post it here.

    And I wish Raja all the best and I am sure he will make it a grand success.

  23. Subhadra, on March 14th, 2008 at 9:49 pm Said:

    That is what I was trying to point out. He has the biggest audience in India and should have been offered some thing in India where he could sing during every program. Since I live in USA, I never got to see Vinit(I am big fan of Vinit).

    Do you think Music Directors will get Raja all the way from Middle East to record a song? I do not think so unless he makes big with Vishal Shekhar.

  24. RajaHasanBacker, on March 14th, 2008 at 9:52 pm Said:

    Sudha, can you check this link out and let us know if this will be part of the Zee Middle East channel?
    http://www.realmediacorp.com/channels/me_programmes.htm

  25. ccie2x, on March 15th, 2008 at 12:27 am Said:

    Hello Friends

    I am Happy that being in Saudi Arabia, i will have access to this program, but why Zee is not telecasting it in india & Northern America.

    I feel sorry for thousands of Raja Fans in India & Northern America, who will not have access to this show.

    Zee you just can not do this ???????

    We will try to upload the show updates & videos.

  26. ramaa, on March 15th, 2008 at 1:34 am Said:

    Yes and they repeat the same Serials 3 times in 24 hours. They show Sa Re Ga Ma Pa 3 times in 24 hours. They should start showing other shows instead.

  27. dood, on March 15th, 2008 at 4:29 am Said:

    woah… MAULI DAVE hosting rock-n-roll family!!

    congrats RAJA!!
    sadly i cant see you on tv. can anybody do that favor of posting ‘em online :) thx!!!

  28. Yasmin, on March 15th, 2008 at 4:48 am Said:

    I am confused. Will this prove to be beneficial to his career or not? I wish I knew.

  29. Sudha, on March 15th, 2008 at 9:41 am Said:

    Yes Manish that is the one. I got to watch this channel when we were in Dubai last year on October 13th! I was not at all comfortable.
    Plus there is no media coverage regarding this programme (Saregamapa 2008) here except for the one ad which came in the papers regarding the auditions for Saregamapa 2008 which took place here more than a month back.
    I really do not know anybody here who is getting this channel. Whether Raja made the right move or not only time will tell.
    Manish you should have been happy to see Mauli anchoring Rock and Rock Family :)
    I was disappointed I think she is worth much more than that!

  30. padma, on March 15th, 2008 at 4:37 pm Said:

    I am personally not too kicked about this.

    I see Raja in an altogether different league from Vinit, Vishwas, etc and honestly Mauli is bound to get more visibility than him with her rock and roll family, ajay devgun, tanuja and kajol et al since it is being aired in India and abroad I guess.

    I personally feel that Raja deserves much better and is just being used by Zee because he speaks urdu and is the ideal choice and massively popular in the Middle East as well just to make their program a success at last in the Middle East Pakistan etc.

    In the bargain Raja is going to lose out on visibility in India, the home ground and in Bombay and Bollywood at least as long as the show will be on. And what we want the most is to see Raja flourishing here and not ending up in Dubai etc where he might be offered monetarily lucrative things as a fallout of the program which he is bound to host tremendously well but will end up as a small fry.

    Wish him all the very best however and wish to see him back and super active on the desi scene very very very soon since this is how it has turned out to be.

    Having said all this, pls pls do upload Raja’s anchoring for us hungry Indian fans of Raja who won’t be able to watch him live.

  31. kavitha, on March 15th, 2008 at 7:18 pm Said:

    @padma

    i second and third everything you have said …Lets just hope and pray his song in De Taali rocks the whole world enough to flood him with offers…

  32. kavitha, on March 15th, 2008 at 7:20 pm Said:

    @padma

    I agree with whatever you have said (twice over !)…I am worried too that Raja might be losing out on some biggies with this Dubai hosting thing…

    Lets just pray his De Taali song compensates for everything……..

  33. padma, on March 15th, 2008 at 8:44 pm Said:

    yes kavitha, we will fervently hope and pray for the same and who knows this might well turn out to be the case!!!
    Raja always had things uphill isnt it?

  34. Kishanraj, on March 16th, 2008 at 8:32 am Said:

    @padma

    I agree with you, this is not good for Raja. He should concentrate on playback singing.

  35. Shaheryar, on March 16th, 2008 at 9:38 am Said:

    God Bless Raja

  36. rupraj, on March 19th, 2008 at 1:39 pm Said:

    yes ,i too agree with padma…may god bless him…at this point of time ,he needs some rocking songs to his credit

  37. Um Faisal, on June 7th, 2008 at 9:04 pm Said:

    Today first time I heard Asma’s song! O MY GOD! Yeh ladki aisi awaz lekar kaise pahuchi idhar! Hum bezuban rah gaye!!!!

  38. Sameer Khan, on June 24th, 2008 at 2:40 am Said:

    Hi
    it was nice when raja hassan was doing well t begining of sare gama show, and since he started as a stunt man with his funny carecters and with chnging his funny voice which is really odd, more over he acts very funny where i starting hateing this more over i saw many coments on this part on him, ofcourse the talent and his voice is good in singing but being a cast/Ancor for sare gama pa really not a good idia compareing to his funny things he does, i wish if he can be replaced to make this program good one and besides this i see many people say the same to me regarding him.and when the part comes of raja hassan in between we had to forcable change the chennal utill he finish off his style and make funny things, with a rajesh khanna stly for a intervel, really feel sick iof him

  39. Divya, on August 19th, 2008 at 3:46 pm Said:

    hay. i m divya. and you. how are you. my mobile namber: 9377016103

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