Ehsan Fazili/Srinagar

Sheikh Anees was 17 year-old in 2005 when he emerged as a sensational voice from Kashmir on the freshly launched television reality show Indian Idol. The boy won many hearts and rose in life as a professional singer is today seeking financial help to treat a rumour he has been detected with and threatens to cut short his dream of making it big.

At 32, Anees, a resident of downtown Srinagar had been making both ends meet with his singing until doctors told him that a tumour was growing inside his brain and he would require Rs 15 to 17 lakhs for its surgical removal, medicines and post-surgical care.

Anees’s had lost his brother and mother to cancer and father to a heart attack.

His singing kept him going amidst these personal tragedies. He became a singing sensation after the Indian Idol show. He would be often invited to host stage shows and participate in musical events in hotels in J&K and Mumbai. Despite his physical disability – his left arm was amputated after he met with an accident in 1992 – he was confident on the stage and passionate about singing. 

Anees Sheikh

Anees was selected as the ‘Voice of North’ by Jio Company in the musical competition held at its Mumbai headquarters in 2019. He also started working for the company for some time. He returned to Kashmir during the lockdown period and was detected with the disease in January.

Recalling his launch into the field of music, Anees told Awaz-the voice, that he was about 17 when he participated in the Indian Idol. His stupendous success was followed by a spell of bad luck for his family. His brother, four years older than him, had passed away due to the disease while he was participating in the Indian Idol.

“When I returned after 40 days in the Indian Idol, I was told that my brother Mohammed Uwais had died due to colon cancer,” he said. The family didn't break this news to him while he was in a happy zone in the TV show.

Three years later his mother also passed away. The treatment of two cancer patients ate into the finances of the family. In 2014, his father Mohammad Ashraf Sheikh, a spray car painter by profession, also died.

The family had barely shifted to their newly-built house at Naseem Bagh overlooking the Dal Lake when they had to sell it and come back to the old house in Khanyar. They needed the money to raise for meeting the medical expenses of the two cancer patients.

Anees Sheikh at a stage show

His elder brother, who is also a car painter, has always supported him. However, Anees says his treatment is beyond their capacity. “Our friends have suggested that we go for crowdfunding,” Annes said.

He left his studies after 12^th standard and took to his passion for singing full-time. It was during the launch of a Kashmiri musical composition in January that he felt dizzy and uncomfortable. Doctors detected a tumour in his brain and told him it has to be removed.

His Kashmiri musical composition, Sahibo Sath Chham….was later used for raising funds for his treatment.

Anees received formal training in singing in Saaz auur Awaaz programme organized by the J&K government to hone the talents of budding artists from schools. “We were made to do riyaz and our teachers were renowned artists like Qazi Rafi and Qaisar Nizami,” he said.

He was one of the finalists in Doordarshan Srinagar’s singing competition show for the budding artists in 2006.