Men in the time of women

Now take a closer look at television: when you see the chic-chicks,glam-ma’ms, the moll-dolls, the sexy-savitris, the mean-queens, thetame-dames (and so on and so forth), how many approximate the real thing, orrather, come any where close to real women?

Where are the wretched and the frail, the abused and the misbegotten, theunwanted girl child? Did you say, who wants to watch them, anyway? Obviouslynobody, otherwise in the crush of competition, some TV channel would havelatched onto them.

Anything to make a buck. Maybe you are right: who wants to watch battered,gaunt women, without Madonna’s backside, Aishwarya Rai’s face, or CelineDion’s glossy lips? Battered women sure don’t, because they have enough ofthe real battering, don’t they? Liberated women don’t, because they’ve leftoppression behind haven’t they (have they?)? The men, oppressed, liberatedor otherwise, don’t, because why should they be reminded of how hateful mencan be to women? And TV sponsors don’t, because it might strike even them asinappropriate to market sanitary napkins alongside a programme in which anine-year old girl is raped as STAR News reported in India Matters.

So instead, television celebrates the more sanitised world of middle andupper class women. Hey, this is no nirvana either. We watch their angst,anger and ambitions; we watch women who have taken the inequities of thepast to the dry cleaners and stepped out, battered but brighter than a NayaUjala whitener, bolder than Taylor in The Bold And the Beautiful (who isromancing her husband’s father) and braver than Arnie Schwarzenegger.

But, look what they’ve done to the men on the way out of the dry cleaners.Male TV characters haven’t been precisely wiped out along with the stains oftheir past crimes (!) but they are not what they used to be. They’re not theinflated, larger than life creatures of the big picture. The TV hero iseither a self-serving amoral prig as Shekhar Suman is in Main (Star Plus) ora self-serving, amoral prig of villainous dimensions such as Om Puri inAntaraal (Plus) Plus), Ashutosh Rana in Waaris (Zee) or Kanwaljeet inAbhimaan (Doordarshan). Otherwise, he is this gentle (read weak), sensitive(read ineffectual), understanding (read indeterminate) creature, few of uswould recognise as a real man.

In Saaya (Sony), Mahadevan cries when he learns Manasi Joshi loves another.In Kora Kagaz (Star Plus), tears trickle down Salil-strapping-Ankola’scheeks just thinking of his runaway brother’s homecoming which would ruinhis blossoming romance with sis-in-law, Renuka Shahane. In Sparsh (Sony),Mahesh Thakur often weeps in the company of his (ex) wife Divya Seth and inRaahein (Zee), Vinay Jain’s eyes moisten each time he thinks of ShefaliChaya (which is rather too frequently for Achint Kaur’s comfort) or sees her(not frequently enough for his).In Alpviram (Sony) Aamir Bashir islachrymose about Pallavi Joshi, period. These weeping willows are symbolicof the small screen hero. For reasons, not immediately clear, TV producers,scriptwriters and directors believe this big softee, appeals to urbanaudiences, primarily female. Yes but is he real? Or does he represent theideal of a modern man? One, men should imitate, one women await? Or is he awarning to all that in the human evolutionary cycle, men will be cutting thevegetables and women the business deals?

The Sunday Times (London) says there has been a reduction in violentHollywood films and an increase in the popularity of family films fromPocahontas to The Truman Show. This is attributed to a larger, wider movieaudience which consists of women and young people, not just young men. Couldthis be true of our television too? Is prime time TV increasingly dominatedby family dramas because women and children constitute the primary audience?Alas, real men are at least two generations removed from the telly-man. Doworks of art, good, bad, popular, classical, or kitsch, reflect the humancondition or do they remain symbolic, aspirational, always a grasp beyondreality?

While on the subject of images, Doordarshan News has acquired a differentone. There is this semi-circular table, with one presenter anchored in thecurve. Aesthetically, it looks rather fetching, though why there should twographics behind the anchors head is disconcertingly unclear. In practicalterms, the news anchor is like a boy wearing his father’s jacket: he or sheis diminished by it. Positively, the Hindi presentation has benefitted fromthe presence of Mrinal Pande if for no other reason than she speaks alanguage which is friendly, inclusive, comprehensible. Remains to be seen ifthis woman on her day, can do something about the contents of the news.