The strange young world on TV

First a few questions that have nothing to do with one another. Does it not agitate anyone that a man convicted of killing another...

First a few questions that have nothing to do with one another. Does it not agitate anyone hello, political parties that a man convicted of killing another, who had to resign from Parliament, still appears on TV shows and commercials? Saw Navjot Singh Sidhu on the Great Laughter Challenge Show Star One as well as the commercial for Luminous whatever and wondered at his continuing ability to spin a bat into a ball isn8217;t that the kind of remark he would make?.

Next: should anyone pay anyone over Rs 50 lakhs for 50-odd minutes of television appearance time? That8217;s Rs 1 lakh per minute. Sounds excessive? It is. And it8217;s what S.R. Khan, reportedly, is being paid to read out questions and answers to questions he won8217;t know most of the answers to, by Star TV. Is there something wrong here or is it that we are downright jealous?

Lastly, are the Hindi news channels so desperate for good news, they need to crack jokes? How else to explain their penchant for stand-up comics? Every day, you can catch one of them opening their mouths for a good ha-ha at a function which the news channels choose to cover for no other reason than to make us laugh at them. Do they think that since they make us cry they should make us laugh too?

Please leave that to Naya Office Office Star One. Pankaj Kapur 038; Co are doing just funnily, thank-you. Proof that you don8217;t need stand-up comics but comic situations to evoke a smile. Last week, it parodied our ability to find ways to be busy at doing nothing. People read newspapers, chew paan, sleep 8212; anything 8212; in order not to pick up a ringing telephone: 8220;time nahin hai mere paas8217;8217; is the tagline. Watch it and forget about the laughter challenge posed by the news channels.

If there is one kind of show that will not make you laugh no matter how hard it tries, it8217;s the soap opera. Instead, it will make you tear your hair out, should you still possess any strands after watching such shows. If you have been a regular addict of Kyunki, Kahani or Kasauti, the three most popular shows over the last six years, you must be mightily perplexed today. Do you know what is going on in any of them? And who are all these people? Other than Parvati, Prerna or Mr Bajaj, I recognise few of them. Where, for goodness8217; sakes is Tulsi Virani? Is she hiding behind white hair, voluminous sarees and calling herself Ba after her mentor? Why?

Because all the soaps have shot generations ahead of their actors. This is evidently due to the demographic shift in India that sees people between the ages of 18-35 dominate every sphere of life. On TV, the fight is for their eyes.

The result? Young actresses are being forced to play grandmothers of other actors who are younger than them off the screen. And those who were already much older off screen have been either killed off on the screen or simply eased out. Now we have a cast of skimpy clothes with nose rings and stand-up hair not comics in starring roles. These are the grand or great grandsons who have taken over the family fortunes. They all look alike, behave alike and bear little resemblance to characters. Not one of them has a distinctive look or dialogue and no matter how hard you try you cannot figure out what they are about or up to and why. It8217;s all too confusing and uninteresting. And, as Rhett Butler said to Scarlett in Gone with the Wind, frankly my dear, I don8217;t give a damn.