An Emirati couple have been quietly assembling a community in Dubai that's not only thriving, but proving to be a cultural bridge between fans of Indian and Pakistani pop culture.
Bader Ali Habib and his wife, Sakina Suhail, are the founders of Saanjh, a community-driven initiative focused on desi pop culture – or the film, music and creative traditions of South Asia.
Founded in 2024, Saanjh has hosted several events with programming that spans Bollywood cinema, Pakistani entertainment, open-mic nights and director-led discussions.
“Saanjh is the first and only community in the GCC that celebrates desi pop culture,” Habib tells The National.
The idea for the community was sparked during a trip to Mumbai in 2023, when Habib and Suhail visited Prithvi Theatre, founded by theatre and Bollywood pioneer Prithviraj Kapoor in 1944.
"We were having our breakfast when we started thinking, ‘We lack a space like this in Dubai,’” Habib recalls. "We have a lot of cultural events happening on a large scale and a lot of small things happening in people’s homes, but we don’t have a community centre that brings desi pop culture together.”
The seed of an idea became a plan in late 2024 when the couple began gathering like-minded film and music lovers through events anchored by artists visiting Dubai.
"We said: ‘You know what? Let’s build a community first. Because we thought if we just built a space, it becomes very transactional," Habib says.
“We started off with the first fireside chat … with an artist called Piyush Mishra,” he adds, referring to the actor, musician and writer associated with Hindi cinema and theatre. “We then went on to do open-mic sessions for the community. And we had a special guest called Mustafa Zahid, a very popular Pakistani singer.”
Over time, the unique selling point of Saanjh, as he describes it, began to solidify – an intimate space where film and music lovers can interact with creators and learn from each other.
For Habib, one of Saanjh’s biggest opportunities sits in a cultural gap created by politics. Pakistani actors and musicians were once thriving in India's Bollywood. However, following the 2019 Pulwama attack, which killed 40 Indian security personnel and brought the two countries to the brink of war, a boycott on all Pakistani artists was instituted by an organisation representing Indian film workers.
Since then, Indian and Pakistani artists have fewer platforms where they can share the same stage, or even be in the same room.
Saanjh has become a place where that interaction is possible again. And it has already shown its pull.
Habib recalls an experience during their most recent high-profile programmes featuring acclaimed Indian filmmaker Anurag Kashyap. “We were reached out to by a very popular make-up artist from Pakistan. She actually flew in for our session because she said she would not get a chance to otherwise meet Anurag, and that she really wanted to discuss something with him," he says.
"That's when we realised there’s a huge potential to scale this over a period of time."
Even the name Saanjh is intentional.
"Saanjh, in Urdu or Punjabi, means evening,” Habib explains. "It reflects how many creatives in Dubai only have time to pursue art after work in the evening, when you unwind.
"But also, nobody can say it’s India or Pakistan, because it’s Punjabi – and Punjab exists in India and Pakistan."
Habib and Suhail met through "an arranged marriage that turned into love”, but it was their shared love for Bollywood films and music that cemented their bond.
"I’ve grown up watching Hindi cinema. I remember the first film that really struck me was the 1994 film Hum Aapke Hain Koun. I might have been about four years old," he recalls. "I found Bollywood colourful and imaginative. While I always watched Hollywood movies, I never got fascinated by them.”
Suhail's entry point was similar – stories and songs playing in the background of daily life.
“My parents used to watch a lot of Indian, Pakistani shows and Bollywood movies,” she says. “So it was always playing on our TV... I picked it up from there.
“Shah Rukh Khan's 2007 film Om Shanti Om was one of my favourite movies at that time."
In the early years of their marriage, the cinema became a routine.
“We’d watch Bollywood films almost every weekend, whether it was good, bad or somewhere in between,” recalls Habib, who later channelled that obsession into a film review series that built a modest following – and eventually gave him the social capital to grow the Saanjh community.
Today, the Saanjh community on WhatsApp is 710 strong, and includes actors, filmmakers, authors, radio presenters and film institute teachers, he says, mostly from the South Asian community.
All activities and events are still funded by Habib and Suhail "purely out of passion".
“We both have our full time jobs,” says Habib, a tourism official who works for the government. “This is something that we manage on the side, and sometimes it gets a little taxing, but the passion keeps us going.
"We take a small ticket price, but trust me it’s hard to offset the costs. If I’m bringing an artist from India, there are flights and hotels, there are permits. We’re now waiting for the right partner to come in, but on our terms."
And there are plenty of plans ahead.
"We recently launched Beyond the Lens with Anurag Kashyap, where we invited him to Dubai and curated a three-day residency,” he says. "The first day included a masterclass, followed by a public screening in partnership with Cinema Akil. Then we had the Saanjh Majlis where him, myself and a couple of people from the industry sit in the backyard of my house and have a fireside chat about him, his philosophy, his filmmaking.
"For me, this was an opportunity to go beyond the cinema and talk to him about life.”
The plan now is to make Beyond the Lens a quarterly fixture, he adds. A second series called Beyond the Frame is also in development.
"It’s more about artistry and acting. It’s more performative, so it’ll be a little theatrical as well," he explains. "The commitment is that we host one event every month of the year moving forward to build appetite and grow the community."
Habib’s long-term vision for Saanjh is still rooted in that breakfast conversation at Prithvi Theatre.
"I want it to be this space where every single Indian, Pakistani artist says: ‘You know what? Take me to this place,’” he says.
Suhail shares the dream of a permanent space – but is also pushing the project towards a younger audience.
“We have a desire to also have a Saanjh sub-culture that caters to Gen Zs as well,” she says.
Ultimately, Habib envisions Saanjh to become a serious platform for India–Pakistan cultural exchange.
“I would love to see somebody like Naseeruddin Shah from India and Anwar Maqsood from Pakistan on one stage," he says.
And he believes being Emirati gives the project a certain neutrality. “We don’t have any agendas here,” he says. "We're purely here for the love of art.”
