Meghraj Ravindra, rapping his way to glory

City-based rapper and actor Meghraj Ravindra was first exposed to rap at a cafe in Secunderabad in the early 2000s

Hyderabad: It is the tiniest of things that can inspire someone or trigger something in a person and ignite a fire to do something unique. The same was the case for city-based rapper and actor Meghraj Ravindra, who was first exposed to rap at a cafe in the early 2000s and he is now a professional rapper who has also composed and rendered tracks in the Telugu film industry.

“I had failed my 10th and I used to go to a coaching centre and one day, I went to a cafe in Secunderabad where a track by Eminem was being played. I was immediately hooked onto that form of music and because I was inherently into poetry from my early years, I decided to try my hand at rapping,” says Meghraj, who comes from a family of freedom fighters and literary enthusiasts.

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After having taught himself DJing on the internet, he later performed as a DJ for a few years at private parties before getting in touch with hip-hop artists on social media. “It was around 2007 that I got in touch with aspiring hip-hop artists from across the country and we started a record label called ‘Desi Media Network’ in Mumbai. We released a 13-track album called ‘Desi Revolution’ and we made a music video with all the artists and we got popular through that,” he says. He came back to Hyderabad in 2010 and started the hip-hop collective ‘Indus Gharana’ where different rap artists came together and blended different forms of music with rap.

The first track under that banner, “Losing Mind” was featured by Vh1 and later he got an opportunity to score music for a Tollywood film and according to him, it was the first time an underground rap group got a chance to score music for a film.

After working with artists like Roll Rida and Kamran for a few years and having done tours all over the country, Meghraj released his first solo-track titled “Who am I?” in 2014. “Ramana Maharshi’s ‘Who am I?’ was my inspiration to write that track. After a few more tracks, in 2016, I released a track called “Manam”, written about sexual assaults. That gave me a lot of traction,” shares Megh-Uh-Watt, as his rap-name goes.

He was then spotted by filmmaker Jeevan Reddy and was asked to be a part of the film George Reddy, to play Cyril Reddy, activist and the brother of the titular character. “Apart from playing Cyril’s character, I also wrote my own dialogues in addition to writing parts of two songs and rendering one song in the film,” explains the rapper, who is known for his freestyle-friday rap videos on social media. These videos are usually about contemporary issues, like his latest one on the ongoing farmers’ protests in the country.

Apart from his work, Meghraj has been doing a simple philanthropic activity. For almost 1500 days now, he has been donating a meal every single day to a needy person. “I heard of people who feed the needy on a daily basis and though I can’t afford bulk donations, I decided to give one meal every day and it is something everyone can do. I usually buy egg fried-rice and donate it but in the lockdown, it wasn’t possible to buy so I used to cook and donate to a needy person. It’s just one meal a day,” he concludes.

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