Nihal

DJ Nihal (born Nihal Arthanayake on 1 June 1971 in Harlow, Essex) is a British of Sri Lankan descent radio and TV presenter who broadcasts on BBC Asian Network and since August 2010 BBC Radio 5 Live. Nihal joined BBC Radio 1 in 2002, to become co-host of a night time Asian Beats show with DJ Bobby Friction coming under the specialist DJ category. The show won a Sony Radio Award in 2003 - achieving Gold standard in the Specialist Music Category for their show: Bobby Friction & Nihal Present. At the end of 2004, they released a compilation album as a reflection of the music they play on the show. After an initial high profile start, the show was re-scheduled to the early morning 'graveyard' hours. Eventually Bobby Friction left the show, leaving the title as "Asian Beats with Nihal".

Nihal became the presenter of the Weekend Breakfast Show on Radio 1, in October 2007, the only one of two DJs to present both a mainstream and a specialist show on the channel, the other being Annie Mac, and he provided holiday cover for other Radio 1 colleagues. In September 2008 he was moved from weekend breakfast to weekend afternoons 13:00-16:00 on Radio 1. On 21 September 2009, Nihal was moved from weekends to a brand-new review programme, named BBC Radio 1's Review With Nihal. The weekly show reviews the latest music. He also became the sole presenter of the specialist Radio 1 Asian Beats show after Bobby Friction left.

In May 2007, Nihal left Kicking Off... to become the host of the daily phone-in talk show from 09:00-12:00 on the Asian Network. In April 2009 his show moved to 13:00-15:00 as part schedule changes. In late 2012 the show moved to 10:00-13:00.

In 2010, he won "Best Radio Show" at the UK Asian Music Awards (UK AMAs) for his show on Radio 1, and a Sony Award for Best Speech Programme for his Asian Network show.

In June 2014, it was announced that in September 2014, Nihal would leave BBC Radio 1.

Links To Peel
In the early 00’s, Bhangra, due to the increasing population of South Asians and the popularity of the internet, became more widespread in the UK, which influenced BBC Radio One to introduce a Bhangra show, presented by Bobby Friction and DJ Nihal in late 2002. The Bhangra show was first shown late night around 3am, which Peel once asked Bobby Friction to give a copy of his show to listen to, as he felt it was too late for his bedtime.

In 2003, Bhangra hit the UK charts with Punjabi MC’s Mundian To Bache Ke, hitting the top ten in the UK Singles chart. This led to BBC Radio One shifting the Bhangra show to a more appropriate timing in the evening, which ultimately led to Peel hearing more of the music: leading to Bhangra act Tigerstyle, getting their first Peel session in the spring of 2003. On his 24 December 2003 show, Peel felt he was still not playing enough bhangra music. However he gave his reasons as not having time to listen to many of them and also stating that those he heard in the year were mostly not good.