Wanted: Tulsi or Parvati

I read an article in the newspaper today that reported a most bizarre trend. It seems more and more men these days are advertising on matrimonial sites such as shaadi.com, for women who would have the attributes of ‘Tulsi’ from ‘Kyunki saas bhi kabhi bahu thi’ or ‘Parvati’ from ‘Kahani ghar ghar ki’!
Its incredible, beyond both belief and comprehension, that such thing should be happening. Though I suspect I have only myself to blame for being so shocked. This was bound to happen sooner or later. We have all seen how popular these serials have become over the last few years. And how they continue to retain their popularity in spite of having way outlived their original plot lines, and jumped several generations.


Smriti Irani’s easy foray into politics and the way people continue to identify her with her on screen avatar, was already an indication of how these worlds of make believe had entered our lives in a direct way. And it was only a matter of time, before the common man would want to embrace these notions created by the television. Men desiring these seemingly perfect demi goddesses such as Parvatis and Tulsis all for themselves, was I guess, inevitable. After all haven’t people always fantasized about filmstars?
What is it that makes them so very popular, I wonder. You see, we have always had a very rich filmmaking tradition. In terms of sheer volume, as measured in the number of films made in a year, Bollywood is the largest filmmaking industry in the world. Of course our budgets being what they are, it still doesn’t come close to Hollywood in size or income generated.
People in this country obviously value entertainment, and don’t mind paying for it. I guess it is only to be expected. At the end of a long, hard day (and I am somehow inclined to believe that a long, hard day in the life of an Indian would be a lot more taxing than that in the life of someone from a more developed country) the common man would be looking for some entertainment. So we have had a long tradition of films which would invariably have two parallel tracks, the main storyline, and a parallel loveline. No matter how strong a theme the film has, it has to have a love angle, and a few songs to showcase it, for it to succeed. Of course there has been a whole parallel movement of serious, thoughtful cinema, as also crossover cinema, in recent times, that manages to stay true to its core theme while still making some amount of profit, bridging the gap between the so called ‘art’ and ‘commercial’ films. But that is not the subject under discussion here, so I’ll refrain from going deeper. Maybe another day, another post.
The funny thing that I notice though is that as films get raunchier and more explicit, in their depiction of women, sex and violence, television on the other hand is going the other way. More and more we see women sexier and with better toned bodies, sporting shorter skirts and lower necklines, on the big screen, while the small screen in inundated with the stereotypical ‘bhartiya nari’, complete with the nine yard sari (or in other cases, salwar kameez), sindoor, mangalsutra and an undying love and devotion to the husband and family.
It’s the same country, isn’t it? And the same people? Oh sure the target audiences might be different. But surely they can’t be that different?
Further what I find rather hard to believe is how Indian audiences, especially women, are gobbling up all the scheming and politics within the family that seems to be the plotline for most of the serials on television. What is it that’s making these rather regressive serials work? Is it aspirational value? For they all them seem to living in palatial homes and doing businesses with mutlicrore turnovers. The women invariably wear designer sarees, are loaded with jewellery and always, but always, look like a million bucks even if they’ve just woken up from sleep. Is it a reflection of people’s aspirations, of what they would rather have in their own lives, that they watch and relish this entirely unbelievable rubbish?
Or is it truly a reflection of our society? Are our families, especially joint families, actually this ridden with jealousy and politics? And all the plot lines actually drawn from reality and spruced up with a good looking facade to make it sell better?
Or maybe it’s a both and more, a complex combination of many factors that ultimately works. Maybe I should contact Ekta Kapoor for answers to some of these questions. I have a feeling she has it all figured!