Music Please!!!

One afternoon, I felt a sudden urge of listening to some new song which I never heard and turned on the TV. I knew where my favorite Channel V was and hit the buttons 7 and 4. Some daily soap based on college was going on. The last time I used to watch TV regularly was till January 2010. I had heard that people change with time. Channels changing with time is a new thing. Okay Mtv is still alive so tuned on to it and voila! Three gals and one guy were sitting together on some large sofa-like thingy and shouting bad words at each other and to a gal. Her eyes were surrounded by what looked like dark circles of weird colour. I realized that it was her tears that had mixed with her hideous make-up which had made that innocent looking gal look no better than Rakhi Sawant. She was standing facing them like she was the accused in a court. After watching for a couple of minutes, I came to know that the guy who looked more like a school boy with spikes and an artificial goat beard and supposed-to-be cool clothes was the King. You can find him now in a soap advertisement where he stands on the top of a waterfall and drops the brand new soap into the water below. Then he makes a great diving and finds that soap from under the water and has his bath. The gals with mini-skirts sitting with him and looked more like his baby-sitters were his Queens. And they were discussing about eliminating the gal they are speaking bad words about. I was losing hopes so went to UTV Bindaas and the good old Emotional Attyachaar ka nth season was going on.

I checked in the newspaper for the list of programmes on these three channels. I saw something called Mtv Grind. Last time I had got a chance to watch TV, I had watched a music programme with the similar name. After waiting for it forever, it started. Some familiar Mahiya song was going on and there were the squeaky VJ Anusha and trying-badly-o-be-cool-dude VJ Ayushmaan half dancing to the tunes of that song and telling us to let the party groove or something. Then the show started. Around 30 skinny gals in negligees were dancing indecently to the song and the camera was focusing on what they were wearing! Obviously I felt like WTH. It went on for 30 minutes. What on earth has happened to the music channels? There is so much to tell so I think I will make a list of the programmes that are originally ridiculous and become double ridiculous as they don’t really fit in as music programmes. 

Competition type with vote-out/eliminations

Roadies

A reality show with nothing related to music. Foul language is like an important part of the show. At least one among the top five contestants doesn’t know to either ride a bike or drive. Then on what basis are they selected? May be on how they face the two angry bald heads who love insulting them on National TV. But that doesn’t get them anywhere near the title Roadies! Do not even ask about the tasks.

Splitsvilla

As everyone knows, it is all about falling in love or rather pretending to be in love and then dumping the person. Crazy as it gets, it will always be the guy for whom the gals will be fighting for. Like a male dominating world, this is a male dominated game with power only in the guy’s hands. Clearly the winner is always the one who manipulates the dumb guy with power the best. Tasks include seducing the guys, impressing the guys etc. Skimpy clothes are a must for the gals. And there is a bajathe raho session where only the gals will be in the receiving end of the insults. Again, if you don’t know to use the right foul language, you are out of the show.

Don't-know-what type

Grind

Okay here there is some music. But as I said, most of the songs are the ones which used to be favourites long back but now it is become boring due to listening to it almost everywhere. Plus the video has unknown gals wearing almost nothing and dancing vigorously. The camera keeps focusing on their dress. I hope you got the meaning. Then from nowhere a male VJ will come and start dancing with the gals. This part of the video is pointed out as ‘The AXE EFFECT Moment’! I can’t decide which emotion to show.

Serials

Humse hai Life

A serial based on college life. Looks like the director and the actors are trying really hard to make it one like Just Mohabbat but in vain.

Dil Dosti Dance (D3)

New concept of making the dancers act in the serial. Combination of a senior Just-Mohabbat-creating-desperation and amazing dance. But why are serials in music channels?

Real reality shows

Love kiya toh darna kya

Two lovers are trying to tell their parents about their love in front of the National Television. I am sorry to say that making our pyaar yaadgaar for the duniya looks good only in films where the hero and heroine will be playing hide and seek in the pine forests of Ooty. But to an extent, this show is Okay. It only got worse when it was a gay couple convincing their parents that they should let them get married just like how it would be if it was a gal. I agree it is their choice. But their parents will never behave with their son’s boyfriend like they would to their daughter-in-law. Ridiculous expectations! 

Emotional Attyachaar

Someone (referred as victim) suspects his/her partner (referred as suspect). The team of the show will send a person (opposite sex of the suspect) and the person will seduce the suspect. Mind you, this person is clearly shown on the National Television. The team including a long-forgotten-celebrity will analyse the heights of the suspect ‘taking chance’ with the person to decide if the suspect is good to be a life-partner to the victim. Now this long forgotten celebrity will be someone who has had so many relationships in his/her life that it might be difficult for him/her to count. But here the celebrity will be speaking about how bad is to cheat on a partner and how infidelity is bad for the victim etc. The celebrity will also try to make the suspect understand the intensity of the crime the suspect has committed.

Axe your ex

Another reality show that gets literally real. Here you can take revenge on your ex for dumping you. Simple, right? No, it is not! The guy or gal who is dumped gives audition there first. If their story seems convincing, they will investigate about both the dumper and the dumped person and meet their friends and decide whether the dumper actually cheated the person. Now there are two possibilities. If the story is true, the one who dumped this person will receive a few days of public humiliation, will get suspected for crimes like theft or murder and later will know that it was a prank. If the story is the other way round then the one who gave the auditions will have to suffer the same humiliation. My question to the organizers of the show is, how can they decide who says the truth? They investigate with their friends. There are many people out there (like me) who are reserved and don’t have friends whom they tell about their relationship. I can come up with some situations where a normal person who doesn’t deserve any of this humiliation will get trapped.

Situation #1: Suppose he/she has dumped their partner because the other one is too possessive. Of course the partner is too much in love but possessiveness will lead to suffocation in the relationship.

Situation #2: If the partner doubts you for speaking to any person of the opposite sex to a really bad extent, you will have to stop dating that person.

Situation #3: If the gal comes to know that her boyfriend blindly follows his parents’ wishes and forces her to do what his parents decide for her, or he himself is very orthodox or believes that gals’ life should be confined to the kitchen only and should not work after wedding, the gal will definitely decide to move out of the relationship.

Situation #4: Another common situation is the guy compelling or forcing the gal for a physical relationship so the gal will dump the guy. Luckily one such gal had good friends. The crew of the show learnt from her friends that the guy who wanted to avenge the gal had compelled her for physical relationship.

What if the above people, who broke their relationship for their own good, had no good friends whom they would share their personal secrets with? They would get a much undeserved revenge. I hope they realize this soon. Now let us give a look at the types of humiliations or pranks they set up.

#1: Getting caught in a theft or murder they never did. Mind you, if it is a guy then he will be stripped and beaten also.

#2: Literal public humiliation. Out in a shopping mall, the people will be asked to listen on to a microphone, and they would announce the person as the winner of the contest and big posters of the person’s picture will be displayed for all to see. The person will also be surprised to see what is happening. And then the posters will also have detailed explanation of what the person does. For example, in one show it was written that the gal uses boys for money and fame.

 

#3: Kidnapped by rowdies who are actors of course and will be shouted at and lightly beaten. His clothes will be removed. Then he will be dropped somewhere on the road when he is wearing bare essentials and they will go off. No money, no mobile, no clothes. He will be struggling to somehow reach his house but he has no choice than to go walking or running on the road. His travel till his house will be shot and recorded and shown on national television.

Now let us see the consequences of such an act. The person gets badly humiliated national television. Their parents might lose all hopes they had on their child. It might get ages for them to prove to their parents that they are innocent. The parents might turn strict, stop their daughter’s education and force her to get married to someone random. The person as well as the parents will feel humiliated to face others or the society. The youth nowadays need no reason to commit suicide. Rest I will leave to the reader’s imagination. 

Steal your girlfriend

This is the worst! There is one person trying to impress their love, no matter if the person is already in relationship or not. If the person is already in another relationship, then the team will try to create differences between the couple and try to have their relationship broken so that this main person will get the one he/she loves.

Thank god there are some music channels like Music India, B4U Music and ETC where there is music going on. But is there no responsibility of the channels? I mean, can they do anything for money? Let me know what you think about this.