Did You Know? Historic 1980 Rock Concert by ‘The Police’ in Mumbai Was Organised by Parsi Ladies
In 1980, Parsi ladies from the Time and Talents Club organised a concert with the rock band The Police in Mumbai. This historic event was the band’s first and only performance in India and marked the debut of a British rock band in the country.
Article by Namya Sinha | Times Now News
Updated Sep 4, 2024, 19:58 IST
The Police band with Sting, Andy Summers and Stewart Copeland. (Photo: www.thepolice.com)
Those who grew up in the late 1970s and 1980s with an ear for rock and reggae would know about the cult following of the rock band “The Police”. With vocalist Sting, drummer Stewart Copeland, and guitarist Andy Summers, the band was a rage until they split in 1984.
Interestingly, the band played their only show in India in 1980, hosted by the ‘Parsi ladies’ of the Time and Talents Club at Rang Bhavan, Bombay (present day Mumbai). Rang Bhavan was an iconic open-air theatre at Dhobi Talao in south Mumbai, which was shut down in 1993. It became a historic concert as the Parsi “aunties” were responsible for bringing one of the most popular rock bands to Mumbai. The event was a fundraiser in aid of the armed forces.
A video posted on the official Facebook page of The Police shows the band members greeting and meeting ladies who were members of the Time and Talent Club as they sat around a table.
As news of their performance spread, people started coming, and Rang Bhavan, with a capacity of 5,000, was full. The merchandise, which mostly consisted of T-shirts, was all sold out!
“We had an idea… It was really our manager, my brother Miles, who said, ‘Let’s take this out. Let’s go somewhere new.’ Of course, there were equipment hassles… the electricity. Where is the plug? At the sound check, they thought that the concert was starting, and they just came over the walls. They trashed all the fancy seats for all the front-row people who paid for the show. We were playing to the people on the street, and they responded exactly in the way that an audience in Leeds would respond, which was pretty cool. That was one of the most emotional shows we ever played,” said Stewart Copeland.
It was Mumbai’s first-ever rock concert by a British band, and the fundraiser ended up being a massive success.