Nihal currently presents the weekend breakfast show on BBC Radio 1 and will dep for Edith Bowman for a month when she takes time off for maternity leave in June.
Nihal has lived for music since he started promoting rap shows in his native Essex while still doing his A-Levels. By the time he was about to graduate he was signed to a major label, and since then he has been a music journalist having written for Asiana, Eastern Eye, The Face, Mixmag, Hip Hop Connection and even the Observer. In the late 90s he was a Music PR working for artists as diverse as Nitin Sawhney, Judge Jules, Mos Def, Beenieman and Elton John. While working for the groundbreaking Asian record label Outcaste Records he promoted Badmarsh & Shri's seminal 'Signs' album securing their appearance on Later with Jools Holland, and Nitin Sawhney's 'Beyond Skin'.
As well as DJing at his own clubnight Nihal has DJed the Isle Of Wight Festival, Glastonbury Festival and Bestival in the UK, as well as club gigs up and down the country. In 2005 he DJed in Bangladesh, Dubai, Germany, India, Sri Lanka, Switzerland, Thailand, and toured the U.S. with Bobby Friction and Raghav. Since 2004 he has presented all three series of BBC2's flagship Asian show Desi DNA interviewing a myriad of people such as Karsh Kale and Padma Lakshmi in New York, Outlandish in Copenhagen and DJ Pathaan in Ibiza, as well as doing pieces on Jay Sean, Ms Scandalous and Freeform Five in the UK.
In 2005 both Bobby Friction and Nihal were cultural ambassadors for the successful 2012 Summer Olympics in London. On December 11th 2006, Nihal solely hosted the Zane Lowe Show on BBC Radio 1 from its normal slot of 19:00pm to 21:00pm, playing the usual '360° of music' that Lowe is famed for. From October 2007 he became the presenter of the weekend breakfast on Radio 1, replacing Fearne and Reggie, who left to take over the chart show and a new request show. He also frequently covers for other Radio 1 presenters, including Edith Bowman, Scott Mills and Colin Murray.
