How far are these reality shows REAL?
The trend started around two to three years back to facilitate the exposure of hidden talents but now it has taken a drastic commercial turn ensuring big financial bonanza for television channels.
I still remember Abhijeet Sawant and Amit Sana competing each other for the first Indian Idol crown in an healthy atmosphere. The people use to enjoy the talent feast and moreover it generated great deal of interest in the minds of Indian youths.
But the next part of the story is very saddening. After the high profile success of first Indian Idol there came an era of reality shows with almost every television channel toeing the same line. In between commercials at crucial junction to maintain the suspense, hot dialogues between the judges to make the show spicy, asking the candidates to request for votes in order to earn money almost every thing was done that is hardly related to talent search. The modus operandi is same of every channel and the purpose is very clear, to earn maximum by banking on the fates of the candidates.
The worst part of it came when a sixteen year old Shinjini from West Bengal suffered partial paralysis and refused to speak after being publicly rebuked by a judge in a reality show .The parents have alleged that the television channel is solely responsible for the critical condition of their child. It came at a time when nation commission for the protection of child rights has already set up a committee to frame guidelines for children’s participating in the show .The commission has requested for the opinion of labour ministry to tackle with this menace which it calls as new age child labour.There are few sections in the society who are in favour of penalizing parents for pushing their child in these shows to earn publicity.
There are frequent tense moments and the channels have exerted enough pressure on the participants which ends up hampering their mental development up to a certain limit. Every year few candidates win the crown and remain in the lime light for few days until they are forgotten, as it is very rightly said public memory is very short. But at the end of the day the channels earn huge amount and look forward to another show.
At last there some reprieve as the child rights commission has taken up the matter seriously and hope the results are witnessed soon. Let’s pray we don’t meet any more shinjini in the same manner.
