The concern about content of the television has been reiterated time and again and the advent of a new reality show that deals with raw truth has once again stimulated it.
“After MTV and VH1, Channel V also enters the league of airing shows which are not related to music. What’s happening can we have a music channel that deals only with music?” expressed, a friend on Facebook’s what’s on your mind space. This man’s plight is very genuine, but he seems to be unaware of the old maxim, “Everything is fair in love and war. Rather TRP war”.
Indian television industry has traversed a dramatic evolution from a single national channel (Doordarshan) to mind boggling number of channels, apart from foreign channels which if added, adds to the bafflement. When there was a single or say very few channels, all genres of shows were telecasted on a single channel, then someone ideated the concept of genre specific channels and rest is history. Still the irony being they find it hard to stick to the defined genre, keeping viewers in dilemma (as mentioned above). As these channels were mushrooming the attention span of audience divided and then is when the TRP war came into existence, and with it came into the existence the never ending league of reality shows which includes the game show trend.
If we go back in time we will find the first reality game show that we used to watch were quiz contests, “Bournvita Quiz Contest” for example was a rage amongst viewers of all age group then. Then it got a bit more complex kids were replaced by adults, quiz masters were replaced by actors (god knows how good their general knowledge is) and last but certainly not the least scholarships and gift hampers were replaced by humungous prize money. This brought in the trend and every channel stepped onto the bandwagon with a difference and is still on with Sony’s “Dus Ka Dum” and the Johnny-come-lately in the list is Star’s “Sach ka saamna”. It was all ok till “Dus Ka Dum”, as it was fetching us money, a chance to meet stars and getting few minutes or sometimes hours of screen presence (hunger of most of the common people). But when someone’s “creative mind” brought in a major replacement, where general knowledge questions were replaced by personal and private ones it switched brouhaha in the country.
Not only this, but it has also made waves in the lawmaking houses of our country too and the reason being a clique in them believes it is against our culture. But hey! Don’t you think we are the descendents of “RAM”, the synonym of truth? So why suddenly are we afraid of facing truth? Is it because of the presence of an audience as big as half or the quarter of the country. No, it cannot be, as audience has never been an issue and probably will never be, as every tom, dick and harry is hungry for the limelight and wants to become famous. This is quite evident from the auditions of the reality shows which have more jokers than people with real talent. So, is it because it has started exposing the hidden side of the Indian society? Bingo!
But excuse me aren’t we over reacting. It was just an idea to entertain us (so what if it is directly proportional to the TRP). So when the participants themselves are ready to sell their secrets in the quest of a million of Rupees, audience should not have any problem. As it is only the participant who when reaches home with prize money is again supposed to play the game with questions raised on their answers in the show and this time asked by the people related to question. So when the participants are ready to lose all, to win sum amount of money why are we bothered, we are supposed to sit and enjoy someone’s truthfulness.Therefore come switch on your TV sets, fill in the couch and just wait and watch as there is still more to come in the great Indian TRP challenge...
The writer is CEO of no where and this is his opinion not of blogger.com
“After MTV and VH1, Channel V also enters the league of airing shows which are not related to music. What’s happening can we have a music channel that deals only with music?” expressed, a friend on Facebook’s what’s on your mind space. This man’s plight is very genuine, but he seems to be unaware of the old maxim, “Everything is fair in love and war. Rather TRP war”.
Indian television industry has traversed a dramatic evolution from a single national channel (Doordarshan) to mind boggling number of channels, apart from foreign channels which if added, adds to the bafflement. When there was a single or say very few channels, all genres of shows were telecasted on a single channel, then someone ideated the concept of genre specific channels and rest is history. Still the irony being they find it hard to stick to the defined genre, keeping viewers in dilemma (as mentioned above). As these channels were mushrooming the attention span of audience divided and then is when the TRP war came into existence, and with it came into the existence the never ending league of reality shows which includes the game show trend.
If we go back in time we will find the first reality game show that we used to watch were quiz contests, “Bournvita Quiz Contest” for example was a rage amongst viewers of all age group then. Then it got a bit more complex kids were replaced by adults, quiz masters were replaced by actors (god knows how good their general knowledge is) and last but certainly not the least scholarships and gift hampers were replaced by humungous prize money. This brought in the trend and every channel stepped onto the bandwagon with a difference and is still on with Sony’s “Dus Ka Dum” and the Johnny-come-lately in the list is Star’s “Sach ka saamna”. It was all ok till “Dus Ka Dum”, as it was fetching us money, a chance to meet stars and getting few minutes or sometimes hours of screen presence (hunger of most of the common people). But when someone’s “creative mind” brought in a major replacement, where general knowledge questions were replaced by personal and private ones it switched brouhaha in the country.
Not only this, but it has also made waves in the lawmaking houses of our country too and the reason being a clique in them believes it is against our culture. But hey! Don’t you think we are the descendents of “RAM”, the synonym of truth? So why suddenly are we afraid of facing truth? Is it because of the presence of an audience as big as half or the quarter of the country. No, it cannot be, as audience has never been an issue and probably will never be, as every tom, dick and harry is hungry for the limelight and wants to become famous. This is quite evident from the auditions of the reality shows which have more jokers than people with real talent. So, is it because it has started exposing the hidden side of the Indian society? Bingo!
But excuse me aren’t we over reacting. It was just an idea to entertain us (so what if it is directly proportional to the TRP). So when the participants themselves are ready to sell their secrets in the quest of a million of Rupees, audience should not have any problem. As it is only the participant who when reaches home with prize money is again supposed to play the game with questions raised on their answers in the show and this time asked by the people related to question. So when the participants are ready to lose all, to win sum amount of money why are we bothered, we are supposed to sit and enjoy someone’s truthfulness.Therefore come switch on your TV sets, fill in the couch and just wait and watch as there is still more to come in the great Indian TRP challenge...
The writer is CEO of no where and this is his opinion not of blogger.com
