Diljit Dosanjh, Bryan Adams: Indians angry at concert facilities

Amrita Kaur was prepared to experience some pain when she made the decision to go to Punjabi music superstar Diljit Dosanjh’s music in India this month.

Ms. Kaur was anticipating the “exhilarating chaos” that accompany massive crowds at big events in India after having previously attended many concerts.

But what lay ahead was far worse than she had anticipated.

Group control was modest and sanitation non-existent. Mobile systems that are overloaded no longer function, causing worries about one’s health. Even using the bathroom felt like a bargain, she said, as it meant having to spend the rest of the functionality queued up in front of “unhygienic, nasty cubicles”.

The venue, a large piece of government-owned land in the northeastern city of Chandigarh, had no common transport connections or parking space, leaving Ms Kaur with no option but to generate her car to a friend’s local- and then get stuck in the obvious, hours-long traffic jam once the concert had ended.

What do you receive if you pay so much for a passport? She describes her experience as having a terrible headache and a possible urinary infections.

This year has been great for India’s burgeoning music business, with big tours by Dua Lipa, Dosanjh and Maroon 5 shipping stadiums and grounds now thrilling audiences. In the upcoming weeks, foreign acts like Green Day, Coldplay, and Ed Sheeran will be playing.

In fact, India’s music concerts generated about 8bn rupees ($94.1m; £75.3m) in revenue last year – a figure that is set to increase by 25% by the end of 2025.

Young, well-to-do Indians are not just willing to pay more to see their favourite music stars, but are actively seeking out these events. In 2023, more than 400,000 people in India said they travelled to other Indian cities to attend live events.

But despite the joy, many concertgoers say their expertise has been far from perfect. The controversy made articles earlier this week when a diabetic person with incontinence problems claimed he ended up staining himself at a Bryan Adams music due to the unavailability of the restrooms at the facility.

Dosanjh, who has been on a national journey, shocked his supporters by declaring that he wouldn’t play in India again until the system at concert venues improved. Eventually, the song clarified that he only spoke about one of the venues.

Since then, social media has been awash with similar complaints from concertgoers. From booking tickets on dodgy scalping websites for astonishingly high prices, to braving hours-long traffic before and after a show, often on a full bladder, fans say they have to pay with more than just money to see their favourite acts.

Those who have the methods are now choosing to go to shows in different nations for a more enjoyable and safer experience. ” At Adele’s music in Munich, the team continuously cleaned the toilet and it was very fresh even after a three-hour concert”, says Ishika Goon, a Bengaluru-based attorney. ” If I have to spend so much money, I might as well go for the whole experience”.

Organisers and sponsors acknowledge the issues, but claim that wider structural issues also cause them.

That’s because India does not have enough facilities dedicated to live music, forcing them to settle for suboptimal areas or merely avoid certain towns entirely, all of which prevents the market from scaling up, says Anmol Kukreja, the co-founder of Skillbox, a live entertainment business that has organised more than 300 concerts.

He claims that events in India must be held in places like malls, sports stadiums, or on public land, all of which have their own limitations and many variables, in contrast to many western nations, where there are numerous concert venues.

A mall might have better restrooms and designated parking areas, but it won’t necessarily be able to handle large crowds the same way a large, barren ground in a far-flung area of a city with poor connectivity might.

Nowadays, many music events are held inside public stadiums to reduce some of the problems, but that also comes with challenges, such as poor sound quality, poor crowd management, and a lot of red tape.

Government-owned venues are more suitable for big events, but the process of booking them can often be a complex “web of permissions and licences, making them less attractive”, Mr Kukreja says.

Tej Brar, founder of Mumbai-based Third Culture and the director of NH7, one of India’s biggest music festivals, says that organizers end up spending thousands of dollars on building temporary infrastructure at venues before each concert to close these gaps.

The live music scene is also impacted by a number of smaller and independent artists being left out because they are not “big enough” to make people want to pay an exorbitant price to watch them, not just business.

” If they can’t pull crowds of more than 10, 000 people or more, they usually won’t get shows because the economics won’t work for the organisers”.

But of late, even major international music festivals with star-studded line-ups and million-dollar budgets have left fans disappointed.

” Everything is fine but why can’t you have clean toilets”? asks Sreoshi Mukherjee, a Delhi-based journalist.

Ms Mukherjee, who attends music concerts around the country, was particularly aghast by the lack of washrooms at Lollapalooza and Backstreet Boys, tickets for which cost anywhere between 5, 000 ($ 59, £47 ) and 10, 000 ($ 118, £94 ) rupees.

There was a point where the restrooms ran out of both water and toilet paper. We had to actually buy water bottles to relieve ourselves”, she says.

There has been growing criticism against inflated ticket prices turning these events into highbrow cultural experiences meant for only a few, but there are also other accessibility issues.

Most locations have little to no accommodations for people with disabilities, such as audio description and wheelchair access. At Dosanjh’s Chandigarh concert, Ms Kaur said they had to carry their wheelchair-using friend into the venue as there was no ramp or accessibility lane.

The BBC has reached out to the organizers of all the events referenced in the story for comment.

Others in the business say there can’t be a one-size-fits all solution for the problems, but they worry about its longer impact on business. Right now, people are still willing to pay. However, persistently unimpressive facilities might influence them.

” Word-of-mouth plays a crucial role in event attendance, and negative feedback can be damaging to an organiser’s reputation”, Mr Brar says.

But the onus to fix that, he adds, needs to be shared. The venue should provide basic amenities while the company takes charge of choosing the location and setting ticket prices. A venue’s standard should include adequate restrooms and devoted cleaning staff.

Fans are hoping for a better experience as the nation prepares to host stars like Sheeran and Green Day.

And for some, seeing their favorite star still comes at a small price due to the large crowds and the risk of an infection.

” There’s a thrill to the mess and chaos”, says Mohammad Sami, a student.

” It’s like you’re stuck on an island with hundreds of strangers, united by their determination to survive the night”.