You have worked with legends like Sir Paul McCartney, Sting, Will Young and A.R. Rahman. What do such associations do to the ego of an artist?
It always humbles me to meet and work with artists I admire, whether it is Paul McCartney or Anoushka Shankar (who will be joining me on stage at this year’s BBC Proms show in August). I’m also a great admirer of her father Ravi Shankar’s work. I was stunned when I was introduced to him and he said he was familiar with my work. I think my most humbling moment was meeting Nelson Mandela at his home in Johannesburg where I interviewed him for my album Prophesy. Mandela, like Gandhi and Martin Luther King, is one of my heroes. Leaders and not music-makers count more as my idols because they have the power to bring people together and exemplify what it means to be a good person.

Every artist has a tone. Yours is strongly political.If I say I am a human being and I need to be treated equally, it’s interpreted in a political way and possibly termed communist. I don’t like the politicisation of simple human terminology and politicians tend to do this. You cannot be passive in the face of political belligerence. As a human being, it’s only natural to have an opinion.