You have toured a lot after becoming popular. How do you like our country within few hours?

He looked at the watch smiling…not sure why. Actually I came to Kolkata for concert several times. Since then I had a wish to get an invitation from Bangladesh and would sing. Perhaps you may feel I am making this up…but whoever saw me in Kolkata could tell this. That I got up on stage and said to Bengalis right away that if anyone here is Bangladeshi then invite me. I wanted to come to this country for long time.

You are doing fusion with folk. Many Indian musicians worked with folk in Bangladesh. Can you please say something about this?

See D.L. Rai, Rahul Dev Barman, Sachin Da every one of them broke into Bangla folk. Whoever does music knows something about it. They had an advantage. First of all they were already main stream…then they researched on origin and nature of music. Nowadays Mumbai elites do not listen much to our songs. Over there Eminem, Pantera broke in house to house. I think the condition is same in Bangladesh. Over here western music entered. So there is not much value here either. And if it has to be brought then there is no way but fusion. So whatever fusion we are singing here is just shadow of the roots.

You have started with jingles which do not match with your current singing image. Why have you started this?

I was inclined to do this. What else could I have done? I didn’t find any other road. I did say that a person cannot set his personality binding with dreams from the very beginning. If anyone opposes this logic of mine I would not believe.

So how did you enter sufi music?

Oho..you have a bit of misperception here. Although I sang jingles whole day to earn money during night at home I used to sing sufi on guitar with friends. After that I saw that “Dermicool” commercial got really popular. So one day I was surprised at a school function. I was requested to sing the single after getting up on stage. Then I close my eyes and sang it. There was a huge response among people in the function. Then it did not take long. I think that program was my turning point.

Then Hindi playback and today’s Kailash?

This is a miracle. I got rare chances in film. When I sang ‘Allah-ki Bande’ in film “Andaaz” then many people said that this voice would not last long in Hindi film; because current film songs are fast and loop. You don’t fall in that category. Many advised me to sing pop. I was telling in my mind that I didn’t even sing shastri when my father asked during childhood. I work according to my will. And who are you to tell me? All I am saying is I have come from a simple background. When people gain more than their dream then not much should be expected from his reception; same for me. I don’t listen to anyone and do as I wish. Then my Kailasha band’s ‘Teri Dewani’ became hit. Now genie’s bottle is in my hand.

Will you sing with James? James is a popular rock singer in our country. He also sang in Hindi films. How much do you know?

I know. He sang Pritomji’s song. His voice is my favorite. It feels good that I would sing on same stage with him. I bought his album after coming to Dhaka. Whoever I sent to buy also bought some of my cds. I saw that already there are pirated copies of mine and James’ joint albums. It felt a bit bad thinking of piracy. But seeing the cover was a bit amusing. Then came the time of press conference. James and Kailash got busy talking. Clicks of photosession. In an interview of Radio Amaar he said in broken Bangla “I can’t speak Bangla but can understand it”. The whole hall erupted in laughter of reporters to what Kailash said.