A concept which became highly popular in the US, reality shows have both gained wide popularity and exceedingly high levels of skeptical criticism. Ranging from some of the earliest appearing on MTV – Roadies, Splitsvilla, to more recent ones which include Bigg Boss, Indian reality shows have covered up an entire spectrum of genres. Just like most Bollywood movies in the 90’s, reality shows in India did not stay far behind in ripping off concepts from the American counterparts. Indian Idol, was one of the first shows to pick up major fan following from the very first season. A similar response was seen for KBC, hosted by none other than Big B, to be followed by SRK.
On the other hand, some like Rakhi ka Swayamvar, seemed like a façade right from the beginning. Like anyone was surprised that Rakhi finally didn’t marry the guy selected on the show.
So how “real” are reality shows? The selection of participants is probably the only thing done on a fair basis. After that it’s all about three letters – TRP (Target Rating Point). How participants continue on the show entirely depend on how the public responds! Most shows bring up fights and various controversies on purpose in order to attract audience attention. To go a step further, they bring in famous personalities in the shows themselves like Bigg Boss (a show focusing on how celebrities stay for 3 months in house and perform various activities).
Not all of them make the idiot box what it is. Some of them like Indian Idol, actually do bring out great talent among the general crowd. Though most of these shows fizzle out as due to internal politics among the judges and sponsors.
Like it or not reality shows are here to stay. They provide a major recluse from the regular saas-bahu serials which in local terms have ‘pakaaoed’ people enough!
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