Waiting for a launchpad

Nitin Singh,a Pune contestant at Gladrags Model hunt won the title in 2002,when he was 25. However,today,he is struggling to find modelling assignments and has instead turned to theatre for a career. “This is because we don’t get the right kind of exposure in the country. Male models don’t have any big event to use as a launchpad. Currently the only pageants we have are all at city level. Gladrags is there but I have found that there is a lot of hype surrounding the event while it going on but once the contest is over,the models have trouble maintaining their recall value,” says Singh.

Singh was groomed for the Gladrags contest by the famous grooming duo,Bunty-Prashant who groom models in Pune and Mumbai. Prashant Patil,one of the two groomers says that there is a dire need for a national level event for male models so that they have the same kind of opportunities that women models do. Pointing out a different issue,he adds,”The problem with Indian pageants for men is that they focus only on the entertainment value for the audience. None of the men’s pageants have enough funding and so,very little is being done to train the models to help them match up to global levels and the models hardly get any publicity themselves.”

Pune-based groomer,Lovell Prabhu thinks there is a gap in the modelling industry and the demand and supply don’t seem to be meeting because the models are not well-groomed and need intensive training and marketing. “Even when we had Mr India and other national events like the Model Hunt,only one Indian man went on to win an international event – Rajeev Singh. Not even John Abraham,whom the entire modelling and movie industry seems to be talking about,won an international event,” he says.

Prabhu is now planning a national level contest,to be held next year. He is in talks with international groomers and international contest organisers. “Together we will organise a contest in India that will open new doors for models here and I hope that the models trained in this event will be at par with any model abroad,” adds Prabhu.

All models,says Prabhu,need to go through a training process that spans across at least 45 days but the current events that are happening for male models,are usually around five to seven days long. The short time,he says,is not enough to groom them and train them. “Aishwarya Rai and Sushmita Sen were not made in five days. To compete at international levels,the models need to be spend substantial amount in training. This will be the prime focus of our contest,” says Prabhu.

It’s time,we start analysing what international model industries are doing differently and why their contest winners consistently do better than ours,says Patil.