Amid the raging Karnataka hijab row in India that has sparked debate over choice, religious identity and empowerment, Pakistan’s webcast Coke Studio season 14 has brought to the fore the country’s first female hijabi rapper who says that veil cannot cover her talent.
The second episode of Coke Studio season 14 premiering Wednesday with Kana Yaari, a Balochi pop song, features the up-and-coming ‘niqab-posh’ rapper Eva B along with primary vocalist Kaifi Khalil and Abdul Wahab Bugti playing the Tambura.
The song has become an instant hit with the audience with over 9 million views on YouTube.
In an interview with The Guardian, the Pakistan talent has been quoted as saying, “I don’t feel comfortable or can’t perform well if I don’t wear it”.
“The veil just covers my face; it cannot cover or take away the talent I have,” she adds.
Going by the pseudonym Eva B, where Eva means a tribute to the first woman on Earth like Eve and ‘B’ as a reference to her Baloch identity, the rapper is the first from her community belonging to the Karachi urban-slum settlement of Lyari in Pakistan.
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Eminem and brother’s disapproval and hijab
It was a computer that Eva B had bought from her friend, and which had Eminem’s album that first made her curious. Initially, she did not understand this music and it was her friend who explained Eminem’s music to Eva, the Pakistani rapper says in this Coke studio video.
She taught herself using the internet and started rapping in 2014, reports The Guardian. However, this did not go down well with her brother who disapproved of it, saying it was ‘not appropriate’. Eva says that her brother’s friends used to tease him about she being a rapper and that her YouTube videos of freestyle rap songs would end up causing fights in the family, catching even neighbours’ attraction.
Discouraged, she stopped rapping between 2015 and 2019, Eva says. “But I did not stop writing,” she adds.
Her mother was supportive all along but her brother told her if she wanted to rap she had to wear a veil which now has become her habit, she says. “I like wearing burqa as I feel comfortable,” Eva says.
‘Gully girl’ to Coke studio
Eva describes her rap as the reality of society, the goodness and evil within an individual but she wants to become the voice of women. She had her first collaboration with her cousin Meer in 2018, says the 22-year-old rapper in this report.
In 2019, with lyrics like ‘zindagi apni hai, toh marzi dusron ki kyun…rasstey na aapke chalegi, meri izzat mere haath mein’, Eva created a retelling of Bollywood title track Gully Boy with Patari, talking about her dreams. The song went viral, earning her the tag of ‘Gully girl’. The description of the music video says that she operated underground using a pseudonym: Eva_B as she was not allowed to rap by her family.
The rapper got her big break when Coke Studio music producer Zulfiqar Jabbar Khan approached her with the project that she readily accepted. The second song featuring her has left many grooving to the bits.
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‘Hijab my choice’
The comment sections of Eva’s Facebook and Instagram profiles, and the latest Coke Studio Kana Yaari YouTube video is full of people writing praises for the song and hailing Coke studio for being ‘inclusive of diversity’.
“This is called diversity. The best thing is that Coke Studio successfully recognizes the talent all across Pakistan and executes each and everything so well,” wrote a YouTube user in the comments.
Another user Aishwarya Mathews said this year’s Coke Studio is different and inclusive with all kinds of music.
However, an Instagram user advised her ‘not to wear a veil because it’s a disrespect to her talent’. The rapper replied, saying, “it’s my choice”.