You might have come across reels on Instagram featuring a strangely childlike, haunting voice singing Jis Din Se Piya Dil Le Gaye, a 1956 Madam Noor Jehan classic.
The sound in some of these reels has been transposed on graphics depicting the loneliness of someone whose sight haunts the distances as the past slowly rises in their chests. Some of these reels even feature Eminem, Peter Griffin, or Batman, all in poses solitary and contemplative of loss and dolour. The Batman in one of these, to give you an idea, is sitting transfixed in a raining parking lot, his mind borne elsewhere on this voice that seems well-suited to ponder the evanescence of things.
In other reels featuring the same voice, you might see the singer herself: a 23-year old, bespectacled girl from Layyah, whose voice as it lilts finds a hypnotic conductor in her expressive right hand. Rawish Rubab is one of the many singers in the current edition of Pakistan Idol, whose renditions of classics of Pakistan’s music industry has won both them and the almost-forgotten music new fans.
This season of Pakistan Idol started with much hype. It was being broadcast over multiple TV channels. Clips of its performances were being regularly uploaded by its official YouTube channel, gaining massive reach. At the same time, the episodes were available to stream both live and post-broadcast on Begin, the first well-funded entrant in Pakistani domestic streaming services, for free.
But most of all, it was the return of the Idol franchise to Pakistan. People who are routinely astonished at the realisation that people born in 2007 can now legally vote and drive would remember well the craze Indian Idol had on Pakistani TV screens in the 2000s. They might also remember the last iteration of Pakistan Idol, which was broadcast in 2013-14 to great popular acclaim, and the decade-long drought since.
There was good reason, then, to hail this renaissance. It’s what this Idol stands for that is a big part of it: a celebration of our musical heritage, which introduces younger and newer voices to be the custodians of that tradition. The newer forms of media, especially social media, have catapulted these singing performers – even though the show hasn’t ended yet – into mini stardoms of their own.
But what is behind this season? What are the different arrangements behind the scenes, and how is this edition of Pakistan Idol capitalizing on changing economies surrounding the smartphone and internet usage as well the music industry? And most importantly, how has this edition of Pakistan Idol managed to capture the collective national imagination in ways that previous iterations have not?
The Idol format and its origins
In 2001, Simon Fuller, a British TV producer and talent manager, came up with a reality singing show format. Inspired by a New Zealand show, Popstars, Fuller was the mind behind the first season of the Pop Idol, for the UK.
The idea was to give a platform to young singers who did not really have a career in music, who had not signed any record deals yet, and enable them to reach mass audiences. These select few were chosen after extensive auditions, where ordinary people who felt they had a knack for the song could try their luck. Once selected, the singers were supposed to perform in various rounds, each with its own themes and challenges. Gradually, with these rounds, the singers got eliminated, and the contest boiled down towards the end to a handful of finalists. Of this crème de la crème was chosen the winner – a much-vaunted honour since it meant not only monetary prizes, but also a recording deal which would help kickstart their professional careers.
A distinguishing part of this format – that perhaps was the key determinant in its undeniable success – was the involvement of the audience, as well as the general population, in the show. Their votes determined in part who was eliminated, who proceeded to the next round, and ultimately who the winner was. This was not simply a clever ploy to boost ratings, but to really engage the audience in a project that was to shape the way music was listened to and interacted with in their communities.
The Idol was on the lookout for stars. That would mean someone who was a great singer, of course, but also a little more: someone who was charismatic and entertaining, someone who people could identify with, someone who could look like they were the future of music. This was entertainment, after all.
Many were the singers it catapulted into fame. Those who heretofore were unknown became household names. This exposure was valuable since it wasn’t always necessarily the one who won, who would go on to have the best or the strongest career. For example, Jennifer Hudson, who came 7th in the 2004 edition of the American Idol, went on to become a rare EGOT, by winning the four major awards in American entertainment industry: Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony
The potential in this show format, therefore, was great. Owned by Fremantle Limited – a media production and distribution company behind successes such as the Got Talent and the X Factor format shows – the rights were gradually sold to other countries. Over 56 countries went on to produce their own versions of Idol, including the United States, South Africa, the Netherlands, Indonesia, India, and Pakistan.
In Pakistan, the first edition was produced and broadcast by Geo Network in 2013-14. Although the rights had been secured years ago, production issues – essentially making the necessary arrangements for the complex adherence to the format’s demands – meant that it was six years before the show finally hit the TV screens.
Although the show was marred by controversies – especially regarding the caustic attitude of the judges – it went well overall. The public participated, the singers sang, and a winner arose.
Rebirth in Pakistan
Since 2014, the format had vanished from Pakistan TVs, and all remnants of the show were to be seen only in pixelated videos ripped from TV broadcasts, and available on YouTube. The singers fell out of the public gaze, and only occasionally would someone comment on a video of their favourite singer from years ago, proffering thoughts on the eventual result, how their favourites were criminally underrated and deserved more recognition, and so on. It became a long exercise in nostalgia.
Until over a decade later when promos featuring the new judges were released. The public was hooked, though pleasantly surprised. The show was finally back, and the years of yearning for some popular TV entertainment that was not TV dramas was finally over. The season 2 of the Pakistan Idol was here.
The bidding process was led by Merchant Holdings Ltd (MHL), a media house owned by the industry veteran Raihan Merchant and which is the main investor behind this bid, and 313 Productions, a newly-launched production house owned by Badar Ikram, the erstwhile Head of Hum Films and a Senior Vice President at Hum TV, with an earlier stint as Managing Director of Geo TV and Aag TV. While MHL would assume the office of the executive producer, it was to Badar’s 313 Productions that the on-ground task of production fell.
Speaking to Profit, Badar explained why they had pitched to Fremantle about the resurrection of the Pakistan Idol. “There was a gap in the market,” he says. “The current entertainment landscape is 99% drama. But, music resonates with young people, and the channels weren’t doing anything regarding that, so we stepped in.”
After working out a proposal that detailed how the complicated arrangements were to be carried out, as well highlighting the potential in the market, they were able to win Fremantle over. The contract they signed was for 3+2 years, i.e., 3 years of production with potentially 2 more where the buyers reserved the rights of refusal. So, evidently, this is a plan to kickstart the rise of the most popular format show in the world in Pakistan, and give a boost to its diabetic music industry.
Part of the show would be overseen by Fremantle to ensure compliance with its requirements as the rights holder of the Idols franchise, which would include, among other things, the make and feel of the studio as well as the shape of the production plans. The on-ground production and compliance with Fremantle’s SOPs, as Badar mentioned, has many challenges of its own.
There are a lot of moving parts. The live bands must be managed. Rights for the music need to be obtained. Contestants too need to be managed. Different sets for different stages of the contest also need to be constructed, each set with different dimensions and design. At the same time, at the scouting stage there were even questions regarding whether they would be able to attract enough talent, especially female contestants.
But, according to Badar, it is all going well, and Fremantle “are very happy with us”. Part of the reason is that these guys are dedicated and driven to revive the live entertainment format show, but also because this is a multi-pronged effort with many partners.
For example, 313 is co-partnering with NJ Media, a “boutique production house” led by M. Nadeem J. This partnership is responsible for handling the TV media side of things, including the shoot, logistics management, as well as the music production. A partnership with Big Idea is responsible for creating the graphics, while Zong and Begin are used to handle the voting process. There are also PR partners working to tell the stories of the contestants. These include platforms such as Fuchsia Magazine, which has been interviewing candidates on its YouTube channel.
This last part is one of the most important parts in the bid to expand the influence of the Idol. Badar emphasized the need of the audiences to relate with and empathize with the contestants, to buy into their stories, and become their “fans”. This, when it happens, would be the tipping point in the journey of Pakistan Idol, since with it comes not only broad influence, but also the monetary rewards the organizers hope to reap.
But, this latter aspect, Badar insisted, was less of a priority than really making the contestants performers and household names, with fandoms of their own. As he said, “It is not how much the show is viewed, but rather how much it is loved”.
The show, therefore, is dependent – like other such shows – on how many people can access it. And here the organizers were able to extract a couple of clauses in the rights contract with Fremantle which were without precedent in the history of the Idols format. One concerned the broadcasting system that will be used in this edition, and the other dealt with the permissibility of remote auditions in the pre-screening phase.
The Idol comes to you
When the previous iteration of the Pakistan Idol aired, it was broadcast primarily on one media channel: Geo TV. And that has been the tradition in the Idol’s history. Only one TV channel is given the rights to broadcast the show to anticipating audiences.
But the team behind this season of Pakistan Idol were able to convince Fremantle to abandon this strict tradition. The show was now to be broadcast in a syndicate model, with production being overseen by MHL and 313 Entertainment, but being distributed on seven different TV channels: Geo Entertainment, Express Entertainment, GREEN Entertainment, PTV Home, AUR Life HD, Aan TV, and BOL Entertainment. While this would imply that none of the individual TV channels has a reach of its own to satisfy the distribution demand of the organizers, it also speaks to the changes in the TV channel industry, where the market once dominated by a few channels is being disrupted by newcomers and smaller channels, each carving niches of their own.
At the same time, the show is also being streamed live on Daraz, Tapmad, and Begin TV. The latter is a streaming app owned by MHL, based in Dubai, and launched in 2023, which allows post-broadcast access to the shows as well. While the earlier episodes are free to watch on Begin, there are plans to put the later episodes behind the paywall.
But the real opportunity these streaming services offer is that it enables the show to be directly broadcast to international audiences, including India, where apparently the market is huge. One only has to go to the comments section of any of the videos put out by the Pakistan Idol YouTube channel to see people from across the border rooting for their favourite candidates and proclaiming the musical talent Pakistan has to offer.
Speaking of YouTube, the Pakistan Idol channel, which currently has 151,000 subscribers, regularly puts out videos of the contestants’ performances – timed almost perfectly to when they are being streamed live on the various broadcast avenues. The videos have been viewed a total over 57 million times, while the most watched video remains the Girls’ Medley in the Gala Round which has been viewed over 3 million times. These numbers are lower than comparable statistics for Coke Studio Pakistan (17.3 million subscribers, popular videos routinely crossing 100 million views), but that show has had about 17 years to build an audience. Pakistan Idol is just getting started.
Other than YouTube, Instagram has also emerged as a key part of this strategy to make the contestants famous. While some of the contestants have their own Instagram pages, where they interact with the fans, much of the music they have sung has also found its way into reels, an odd form of honour. Often the contestants also post backstage videos of them interacting with each other, having fun, and becoming friends.
There are also plans to launch the Idol performances on Spotify, with talks being currently held with several music labels to make that a reality as well.
At the same time, there has been a general – gradual, but sure – shift away from TVs to mobile phones which provide 24/7 access to content. A recent survey conducted by Gallup Pakistan, revealed that more 54% of Pakistanis now owned a smartphone, surpassing the percentage of people who own TVs (46%). While smartphones dominated urban residents and the younger segments of the population, TV found more purchase in rural areas and the older generations.
It is in these forms of social media, which are more likely to attract younger audiences, that the show will find independent marketers and bona fide reach-makers. Once the Idol regains its place in the local cultural lexicon, and as social media consumption continues to rise, it will likely snowball into its own mountain.
The internet show
The second major unprecedented concession that the organising team was able to obtain from Fremantle was the allowance of online auditions in the pre-screening phase. The concerns behind this demand were regarding the mobility of people from far-flung areas, as well as to make it easy for female participants to participate, who won’t have then to stand in thousand-souled queues just to be screened for audition before the judges. Of course, the shortlisted candidates from these virtual auditions would still have
You might have marvelled at the professional and refined audition rounds this time, quite unlike the raw, often idiosyncratic characters with every sort of odd performance that were the stuff of conversation in the Idol editions of yore. Now you know the reason behind it.
Pushing for remote auditions was also an effort to leverage the expanding internet coverage in Pakistan. With the ever-increasing smartphone ownership in Pakistan – across classes and regions – the internet has seen a similar rise in reach. Assisted by the (comparatively) low-price of locally produced phones, and the cheaper broadband internet packages, mobile internet has seen rapid rise in Pakistan.
Official statistics by the Pakistan Telecom Authority reveal that as of October 2025, there are 148 million mobile broadband subscribers in Pakistan, while the number of regular broadband subscribers is 152 million. Assuming that there isn’t a totally neat overlap between these two groups of internet users, the total number of internet users in Pakistan is a significant proportion of the 250 million population.
This conquering horde of smartphones on their broadband couriers is quickly conquering the country. And therefore, there was a double opportunity for the organizers of Pakistan Idol to leverage that.
The first was obviously to increase the pool of potential contestants, by making the conditions for participation easier so that excellent and diverse talent would not have to face too many hurdles to access this opportunity.
The second concerns the revenue side. Social media has great potential to bring in bucks as evinced by the case of Hum TV, in whose share of revenues, YouTube has seen a rise in the share of their total revenues, reaching 17.7% in 2024. This was actually a dip from the record high 25% in 2023. This dip was not due to a fall in revenues, but due to the size of the total pie being increased with the acquisition of Ten Sports.
However, as Badar pointed out, the monetization from these views does not start until at least six months have passed. So, currently while there are no proceeds for the Idol organisers from these views, the situation will surely change. It is only a matter of time. In fact, this is a part of the plan. According to Badar, such multi-year contracts are not profitable in the first year, but only start to pay dividends later. In the first year it grants them the necessary infrastructural and technical clarity and makes them a national name. The cash comes in later.
In all this, the revenue from these social media posts will soon become a more important part of the digital revenue. It is, after all, where the show’s key target audience – the younger generations – gets their fix, and where they haunt all their days and nights.
In musical context
In all this, we can see how the traditional models of making money are being supplemented with newer internet-focused means, and how the timing for the revival of Pakistan Idol is just right.
In the 1990s and 2000s, virtual musical entertainment for the public was mainly concentrated on TV channels that were dedicated to music, as well as the broadcast of international music contest shows, especially from India which included the Indian Idol, but also joint Indo-Pak musical contests such as Chhote Ustaad. The channels dedicated to music included names like ARY Musik, 8XM, Oxygene, and MTV Pakistan. The key way of making money here was through the sale of broadcast rights as well as broadcasting.
Although there was a considerable audience, especially for the musical contest, the reach was limited by access to the medium. Those who had the TV could watch it, and those who did not mostly could not. At the same time, the content could only be viewed at certain times, and there were great barriers to sharing and building communities surrounding the music on TV.
These were followed – though there was a considerable overlap – with the development of musical ecosystems that saw and capitalized on the opportunity presented by the internet. These would include shows like Coke Studio and Nescafe Basement, a major bulk of whose viewership was through online social media, primarily YouTube. Supplemented by the rise of streaming services such as Patari, and later Spotify, these relied majorly on digital revenue streams to make money.
Beside the obvious consequence of these platforms encouraging local musicians to produce music, and providing some opportunities for them to make their big or first break, these also laid down two different ecosystems. One geared towards the TV, the other towards the phone.
The first platform to really capitalize on the possibility that these two did not need to be kept separate but together could open new opportunities to drive engagement and revenues was the second season of the Pepsi Battle of the Bands. Released in 2017, the Battle followed a syndicated format along with mechanisms for online viewing and posting of the shows.
At the same time, the processes have become more streamlined, since there are now precedents to learn from and improve upon. While TV ads that are run during commercial breaks might be cheaper, the advertisers like to have their products be a part of the show itself. One only needs to remember the Tapal Tea Moments during cricket matches in Pakistan to remark at what has become almost a standard practice across the entertainment industry.
In a show like Pakistan Idol, for example, which is also relying on proceeds from online media platforms, such advertising opens up newer modes of partnerships between the producers and the sponsors. For example, we see how on YouTube, some of the latest videos uploaded by the Pakistan Idol official channel also show EcoStar as one of the collaborators in the media, something unprecedented – at least at this scale – in the Pakistan music industry. This would obviously not only bring in money for the organizers, but also enable sponsors to expand their reach in newer ways, that might bring them more visibility.
Pakistan Idol therefore finds itself in a moment rife with opportunity. Building on and refining a developing ecosystem, they have come up with an ambitious plan to revive what is the biggest musical show in the subcontinent. Currently with a 40-episode plan, each with its own themes and musical and performative requirements, it is surely an ambitious project. But with what we have seen until now – the production quality, the calibre of the contestants, and the expanding reach on social media – they are likely to pull it off, and usher in a new chapter in the musical annals of Pakistan.
Why the show resonates now
But perhaps even more than the sophistication with which the producers have launched the show is the hinge moment in Pakistan’s cultural and economic history in which the show is being launched. The songs being sung are often from a past Pakistan that was poorer, sadder, and generally more dominated by themes of struggle. The present – embodied by the show’s contestants – may be from varying socioeconomic backgrounds, but there is more hope in their own futures.
A moment that captured this more than most was during the auditions in Sukkur. The contestants were dressed very simply, in clothing one imagines was not too different from what they were at home on most ordinary day, a reflection of still small disposable incomes in most households. Tariq Ali, one of the contestants from Jacobabad, had a high fever from malaria, an illness that mostly exists when the public sanitation infrastructure has not yet been built up in large parts of most cities in Pakistan.
But he and his fellow contestants stepped onto stages that were the modern Pakistan: with lighting, backdrops, and sound that would not be out of place in a developed economy, judges dressed in clothing that was more elevated – and perhaps a bit costlier.
As they sang their hearts out, whatever the themes of their songs (and some of them are rather sad ones), one felt a sense of hope and joy: hope for the contestants coming from the most ordinary homes in ordinary streets in Pakistan and their ability to rise above where they were born, and a small amount of joy in knowing that the economy has developed to a point where the size of the pie is large enough to support serious careers for many, if not most, of these aspiring artists.
There are the interviews with parents who are encouraging of their children’s aspirations for careers in the performing arts, something that was virtually unheard of in the 1990s, because again, there is an understanding this economy has room for more than just traditional careers in things like medicine, engineering, business, or government. Artists in Pakistan can not just make money, but have reasonably financially stable lives even without outstanding success.
We watched the show and saw the faces of Pakistan, and rather liked what we saw, perhaps in ways we were not expecting, and that serendipity sparked joy.
For all the views and online comments from outside the country, Pakistan Idol is fundamentally a conversation Pakistanis are having with ourselves, about our past, our hopes and dreams, and a nervously optimistic outlook for our own future.
