Long drawn selections

“We want to bring various TV professionals from across the country under one platform,” he said. He began his introduction with the clarion call Idiot box zindabad’. Next came a bevy of presenters. First on was Usha Utthup who talked about peace, brotherhood, gajra, kanjeevaram sarees, please clap, thank you…and ended her out-of-breath rhetorics with four lines from a song. In between, she did find the time to read out the names of a few nominees.

Then came Astad Deboo whom Roy introduced as being “a little sober today”. Other categories were read out by celebs such as Vinta Nanda, Karuna Samtani, Sajid Khan, Anju Mahendroo, Roshan Abbas, Shobha Khote and Bhavana Balsaver. But the one who left a lasting impression was Tabassum. She launched into a not-so-concise history of Tabassum via Indian television.

For those who think that TV is still the down market cousin of films and a sleepy backwater town where nothing much happens, here are a few interesting titbits. The 21-member selection committee consisting of Aloknanda Roy, Bhavna Somaya, K S Sethu Madhavan and others, had to wade through 1200 entries and around 3000 viewing hours in seven languages, across 30 channels. The initial list had 126 distinct categories — a figure that made Roy reel and faint.

So, to avoid the awards taking on epic proportions, the categories have now been trimmed down to 56, totalling 204 nominees. The names include Kanwaljeet in the serial Daraar for Best Actor and Renuka Shahane in 9 Malabar Hill for Best Actress. Jaaved Jaffery figures in the list for the Best Host of a film-based programme and Annu Mallik for Best Host of a music-based game show. The awards will be held in Delhi at the end of the year.