here are myriad reasons why something like the Lux Style Awards may seem frivolous. But if life goes on, as the adage notes, so does the show.

However, within that one show, we have hoped to create our own modern version of a fashionable award ceremony that is meant to recognize talent across various fields of the performing arts.

Every year comes with its own set of controversies (from victories, losses and snubs). But this year, in the music segment, if some things went in the right, most also went in the very, very wrong direction.

You can’t teach an old dog new tricks, isn’t that what they say?

The 22nd edition of Lux Style Awards, in its wisdom to transform the music categories, made a jury of experts mostly pointless. Left to the public’s devices, the results that emerged were as misogynistic as the country itself. Promoting an insular take on pop culture, it hardly did justice to any gender except that of boys to men.

Firstly, the Critic’s Choice, made up of an unknown jury, forgot the history with which the music section of the LSAs has been evolving. The jury introduced a Critic’s Choice category that was done away with for all the right reasons years ago. Who, in the world, thought exhuming the Best Music Producer category, and stacking the deck with five Coke Studio songs was a good idea?

Well, apparently, a jury of experts. According to sources close to the LSAs, it was a jury that decided that give the highest points to all five songs that came from Coke Studio 14. History, it seems, was forgotten.

But we’ve discussed that already.

As for the rest of it, most categories were converted purely to Viewer’s Choice. Can self-submitted nominations by artists validate talent? Is it an accurate depiction of the response to music released in the past year? No, if anything, it was the opposite.

In the Viewer’s Choice cate-gories section, submissions were closed after portfolios were submitted. No jury was involved. Once the submissions were closed, voting began through the LSA website. From the sub-missions in each category, the top five became the nominees. All of it was tabulated via a certified audit firm.

“In addition, the LSA office sources information from public domains and available data [of] releases during the period. They also get submissions indepen-dently from artists and check for eligibility of timing and comp-leteness and then post on the portal for voting.”

That hardly sounds like a neat process.

Out of the three categories, Song of the Year is the most significant one. And since it exists, there was no need for Singer of the Year. Best Artist of the Year would’ve made more sense and if you look at that list, another set of nominees would’ve emerged. Atif Aslam was the most popular artist of 2022. Where was a nod to rap and hip-hop that have been the genres of the season? Where was the Best Music Video Directors category?

As happy as we are for the victory of Kaifi Khalil and his win for Song of the Year, the Singer of the Year category makes no sense since the music segment is the shortest one. It was also the most baffling one.

If Song of the Year went to Kaifi Khalil for ‘Kahani Suno’, Singer of the Year went to Ali Sethi for ‘Pasoori’ even though Shae Gill deserved to share that trophy just as much. Sethi and Gill complemented each other in the song.

To consider one without the other sounds unimaginable and yet, Shae Gill was left out.

Welcome to Pakistan, the land of unabashed and celebrated misogyny.

The category of Most Strea-med Song of the Year also went to ‘Pasoori’ which is neither here nor there.

We knew it would win at least one award because the song was everywhere in 2022.

So, if you look at it, technically and objectively, not a single woman won in the music segment of the LSAs.

To add fuel to fire, sub-missions for this year’s edition for music included an artist who is an alleged harasser with all cases being subjudice.

This legal term means that it can’t be discussed in public, but as objective individuals, we do know what it means.

The nomination process and submission of portfolios should be known to one and all. But how many artists actually knew that they had to submit a portfolio to be considered because there was no jury?

A senior musician, on the condition of anonymity, admitted that never in the past had he submitted a portfolio.

Another artist, not to be named, asked me if they were still eligible after submissions were closed, primarily because while evolution is necessary, it should also be advertised well.

Clarifying the process of the path to being nominated, keeping an alleged harasser out and reconfiguring categories to make room for women, it seems, is the way forward.

Otherwise, we can look at the music segment and note that while other industries are getting bigger, music is not only beco-ming smaller in terms of nomi-nations but also the musical culture it promotes, which is purely misogynistic in an incre-asingly misogynistic society and play Russian Roulette with objectification of woman but not of their talent.