DENIS observations of multibeam galaxies in the Zone of Avoidance

Roughly 25% of the optical extragalactic sky is obscured by the dust and st ars of our Milky Way. Dynamically important structures might still lie hidd en in this zone. Various surveys are presently being employed to uncover th e galaxy distribution in the Zone of Avoidance (ZOA), but all suffer from ( different) limitations and selection effects. We illustrate the promise of using a multi-wavelength approach for extragalactic large-scale studies beh ind the ZOA, i.e. a combination of three surveys, optical, systematic blind HI and near-infrared (NIR), which will allow the mapping of the peculiar v elocity field in the ZOA through the NIR Tully-Fisher relation. In particul ar, we present here the results of cross-identifying HI-detected galaxies w ith the DENIS NIR survey, and the use of NIR colours to determine foregroun d extinctions.