Lyricist Puneet Sharma: ‘They had to protest because they had no option’
29 July,2026 07:34 AM IST | Mumbai | Priyanka Sharma
Lyricist Puneet Sharma, who released ‘Sadak Pe Utar Ja’ to express solidarity with students, says the song reflects how the system compels youth to protest when they’d rather live their lives
Puneet Sharma. Pics/PTI, Instagram, By Special Arrangement
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Protest isn’t something we want to do, it’s something the situation compels us to do. That is the thought driving lyricist and screenwriter Puneet Sharma‘s song, Sadak Pe Utar Ja O Saathi. It was released on July 27 to express solidarity with the youth, who, over the past 10 days, took to streets to protest against the NEET paper leaks and demand the resignation of the then-Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan.
The opening lines of his song, âSadak Pe Utar Ja’
Interestingly, Sharma had written it as a poem during the anti-CAA and NRC protests. “When I looked at the teenagers protesting on the streets, I felt the same thing I had felt when I wrote the poem in 2020. Inko protest nahin karna tha; they had to protest because they had no option. Nobody wants to go to the street with the fear of being detained or beaten up,” he told mid-day.
The protest that was held at Jantar Mantar until July 25
The moment he readied the composition, he knew Swanand Kirkire‘s voice would make it come alive. But time crunch threatened to play spoilsport as Kirkire had to fly out soon. “Swanand-da was recording something at a studio, so I took an extra hour and we recorded it. My friends helped me with the song. I told them this was going out to the public and it would be a royalty-free song.”
(L-R) Abhijeet Dipke and Saurav Das
Even as many artistes are reluctant to speak on political and social matters, Sharma remains vocal about his politics through his work. For him, silence is not an option. “Most of the people who went for the protest are [viewed as going] against the country. The whole point is that we are with the country. We are letting go of our leisure because we love our country. What are we getting out of it, other than seclusion from mainstream media? Even if there will be a million dislikes, I will still voice [my stand] for my conscience.”
On celebrities speaking up about the student protests:
“After the movement became unavoidable, you saw people posting about it. This age group [of protesters] is the biggest market, so nobody wants to make them unhappy. So, that was the safe space [the celebrities] were coming from. They were saying it’s wrong, but not talking about the what and how of it. They were talking about the symptoms, not the disease”
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