Shava Shava for 11 days!

Say Shaava Shaava

Karan Johar will judge a 11-day musical reality show

He's served a hot cuppa of coffee on Star World, and now Karan Johar is bracing himself to grace the judge's seat on NDTV Imagine's musical reality show Shaava Shaava. Even though he's played a judge on his rapidfire round on Koffee, this time around he'll be expected to rate the sur and taals of celebrities trying to sing. Here's K-Jo telling us why he took up the show, and how he's terrible at singing himself.

What made you take on Shaava Shaava?
I quite liked the concept. It's almost like an 11-day marriage ceremony that begins with the sangeet, the preparation leading on to the actual wedding. Even though it's a competition we are treating it like a sort of celebration. There will be actors who will compete with each other to prove themselves as the better singers.

What's your take on musical reality shows, there are so many on the tube today?
I am aware of that, but Shaava Shaava strives to do something different. We don't plan to drag the competition on forever, also you won't see me doing walkouts or any unnecessary sort of drama. It will be a sweet environment with no negative vibes. We want to choose the better singer out of the lot, not create any animosity among anyone.

Do you get time to watch television?
My mom is an avid telly watcher. She knows all her Tulsis from the Parvatis and the Jay Walias from the Samrats. Thanks to her, I am updated on who's doing what on which show. Also when she heard about Shaava Shaava she knew most of the participants and was pretty excited. In fact, she plans to come on the set for the first few shoots.

Will you be strict as a judge?
No, I will be quite the opposite of Simon Cowell. I am not a singer, and can't sing to save my life. So I am not in a position to check out the sur and taals of these participants. I will see how they perform, present the song and above all how it sounds to my ears.

Do you expect the contestants to woo you by singing hits from your films?
No. We already have named the show on one of my songs. I would, in fact, love them to sing other songs.

The participants

Aman Varma
Apoorva Agnihotri
Divyanka Tripathi
Juhi Parmar
Mouni Roy
Narayani Shastri
Pulkit Samrat
Sumeet Raghavan