Shanti Raj is like a pied piper leading northern suburbs teenagers on a path away from harm. He is a disc jockey with a difference – it’s not just about the music, it’s about the message.
“Kids can have fun without getting high,” he says.
Raj has been mixing music for gigs since he was 14 when his parents bought him a cheap DJ set.
He soon earned enough to buy a professional kit.
Now 19, the Epping teen is teaching other kids to be DJs and running alcohol and drugfree dance parties for the Whittlesea council’s youth services department.
He became involved with the department as a 15-year-old and is now a casual worker with the youth team.
He enjoys being a mentor and role model.
“It helps to be young yourself when you’re working with kids,” Raj says.
“They relax, feel more comfortable and chat with their mates in front of you.” Raj says older teenagers and young adults who go to clubs and take drugs set a bad example for local youth.
He says council events, like the dance parties, provide an alternative path for younger teens.
‘‘It’s about getting kids off the street …
by coming to our events and being safe.
We’re teaching kids they can have fun without drugs or alcohol.
‘‘We get big crowds; the last event on March 15 had 350 kids dancing and enjoying themselves without booze or pills at Epping Hall.
“The [council] events are strict and we check every peep [person] but it is fun, the music creates the buzz.” It’s not just the younger teenagers enjoying themselves – Raj is having a ball too.
At the gigs he turns his baseball cap backwards and plays his favourite hip hop and R & B artists.
He’s even been known to play two CDs with the same beat and switch between them.
It’s nothing like the old-style DJs with vinyl records – but what hasn’t changed is that it has to please the crowds.
Raj has a theory about play lists.
He plays new music or slow songs early in the night and switches to “old favourites” about 10pm, when the teenagers are ready to dance.
“Old” hits include Shaggy’s It Wasn’t Me which was released on the multiple platinum album Hot Shot in 2001.
Keeping in mind that Raj was only seven years old the year Hot Shot was released puts the “old” description into perspective.
“The good old songs are for later in the party, songs like Candy Shop by 50 Cent and Yeah by Chris Brown,” Raj says.
“I love it when you put on some banging song and the crowd answers you by getting up and dancing to your music; it really motivates you to do better.” Working with the council has also motivated the former Lalor Secondary College student, who finished school two years ago, to create his own path.
In June he starts a four-year youth worker degree at Victoria University and will complete the traineeship component of the course at the Whittlesea council.
Over the next few months, he will also hold DJ workshops, including one exclusively for girls, where teenagers learn the tricks of the trade, then hold a dance party – free of alcohol and drugs, of course.
Away from the dance fl oor, Raj, who migrated with his family from Fiji when he was eight, has forged many friendships on the football field.
He is a member of the Bharat Bombers, a football team made up of players of Indian descent and supported by the Essendon Football Club.
The team competes in the Unity Cup, a competition established by police several years ago to help strengthen ties between the police and other culturally diverse communities through a mutual appreciation of Aussie Rules.
The cup is now part of the AFL’s multicultural program.
Raj’s team won two out of four games in this year’s competition.
Whether he’s playing music or football, Raj is showing kids how to find a safe, fun path through life.
For information on upcoming workshops, call the council’s youth services team, Baseline, on 9404 8800.
