Abhijeet Sawant reveals all love angles in Indian Idol 11 were ‘fake’: ‘No clue about this season’

Abhijeet Sawant said that too much importance is being given to ‘extra elements’ in Indian Idol now, instead of focusing on singing.

Singer Abhijeet Sawant, the winner of the first season of music reality show Indian Idol, talked about how singing has taken a backseat in the scheme of things. He rued that the focus on ‘extra elements’ has proven detrimental to the quality of singing.

Abhijeet Sawant won the first season of Indian Idol.

Talking to BollywoodLife, Abhijeet said, “Duration of extra elements used to be short at our time. But more relevance is being given to these elements today. They must give challenging work to the contestants. When you work more on other elements, the level of singing goes down. This is my biggest issue or concern. We must spend more time on singing.”

Abhijeet also talked about the romantic angles on Indian Idol and revealed, “Every such element was fake in season 11, I have no clue about this season.” He was referring to the promos which suggested that host Aditya Narayan and judge Neha Kakkar would tie the knot. “We need to balance such creative ideas with singing. We must be famous because of our singing and not because of these stories,” he added.

Earlier, Abhijeet had criticised the makers’ focus on the contestants’ backstories rather than their singing abilities. He had cited the example of regional reality shows where the spotlight is purely on talent.

Indian Idol 12 has also been at the centre of a huge controversy after its Kishore Kumar tribute episode. Kishore’s son Amit Kumar, who was invited as a guest judge on the show, later told a leading daily that he ‘didn’t enjoy the episode at all’ and just followed the team’s instructions to praise all the contestants.

Many, including Aditya and Indian Idol 12 judge Manoj Muntashir, said that Amit should have conveyed his displeasure to the makers at the time of the shoot. Singer and former Indian Idol judge Sonu Nigam, in a new video, defended Amit and appealed to everyone else to stay out of the matter.