Modi era has birthed its own Azadi songs — ‘Bella Ciao, Wapas Jao’ to ‘Kaagaz Nahi Dikhayenge’

The years 2020 and 2021 have been bookended with two protest songs — Poojan Sahil’s “Bella Ciao, Farm Laws Wapas Jao” at the farmers’ protests in Tikri and Singhu, and Varun Grover’s “Kaagaz Nahi Dikhayenge” at the Shaheen Bagh anti-CAA-NRC sit-in. These anthems are acting as powerful unwritten literature of anti-Narendra Modi government protests just like Dub Sharma’s “Azadi” remix after the 2016 Jawaharlal Nehru episode.