Of "Mega" importance

Finally!
One of the most watched (in fact, THE most watched mega serial) on Tamil Sun TV is over, my father in law informs me. Of course, there's another, right in its place, produced by the same people! But I was thankful that all those people that were hooked onto it finally had a chance to let go. Now this serial, Annamalai, was not bad as serials go, but a dangerous trend was popping up.

In order to draw maximum emotions from viewers, there was a lot of gore and violence in the serial. Of main concern were these "deaths" that were part of the story line. And not just deaths, they were murders. What's worse, it wasn't confined to the death- one of the final rites was shown with all its accompanying rites and rituals, almost in "real time." And one of the deaths was that of a high-school boy. Considering that this was the most watched TV serial among all age groups (even the 11 to 14-year olds), it is , to say the least, extremely disturbing.

My parents-in-law could not sleep that night, and reports came in that several mothers wailed during that particular episode. Now, while it maybe argued that veracity is important in television culture, children's exposure to gruesome details of death is quite horrifying. Being the mother of two, the producer, actor Radhika Sarath Kumar was way out of line.

This is a disturbing trend among many Tamil (I'm not sure I can apply it across the board to all languages) serials- the screaming, wailing, melodrama that serves no purpose. It does seem like writers have run out of ideas to emotionally touch the viewer, and want to touch raw chords. Each "Mega" (as they are called) is trying to outdo the other, much like the villains of the movies through the 80's- when every villain worth his salt wanted to outdo Gabbar Singh's viciousness.

One other popular serial, which deals with the middle class, has a mother-in-law who screams profanities at the daughter-in-law, with a definite bias towards the higher decibels. What this achieves in terms of the story line is unclear, except justifying shouting as a legitimate form of persuasion.

A talk show on Sab TV (which, in my opinion, is one of the better channels on Indian Television) spoke about the phenomenon, and experts felt that it was just a case of who could move the audience more? Gone are the days of subtle emotions and propriety in television. If it were not for the fact that television is the main entertainment for a lot of Indians, and the fact that children's television on Indian TV is almost non-existent, it might have even been bearable.

A related issue is the appalling lack of sensitivity of the news channels in dealing with tragedy. While even a child would know that American TV adheres to a strict code of conduct while dealing with tragedy, some Indian channels (I'm only familiar with Sun TV in the US, and it is the most watched Indian channel among Tamils) have no such control.

While even the most violent Sept. 11 was televised in a respectful way (albeit after a few snafus), so as to not hurt the sentiments of those who lost loved ones, the tsunami coverage on Sun TV left one cringing. There were mothers beating their chests and wailing uncontrollably on TV, and bodies being thrown into a pit in lieu of a burial. One just fails to understand the objective of such coverage, and the absence of a warning to parents on the graphic nature of the images.

My friend's niece from Chennai, barely 4, kept asking questions about the tsunami. With just the images she had on TV, and no sort of supporting information, she was terrified that the wave would come and take her away. Needless to say, the school did squat about it.

While the whole state was in shock, it was still the media's duty to be respectful to the departed, and lend some dignity to the living. Add to that subtle placement of reports about mismanagement by the State Government (Sun TV is owned by Karunanidhi, the opposition in the Tamilnadu Assembly), and anyone with minimal reasoning powers would be left angry and horrified at such opportunism.

This is not the first time this has happened either. When the Kumbakonam school tragedy (when over a 100 children were burnt to death), there was total disregard for decency and charred remains of children were flashed on the screen with impunity. And then there were reports of Government ineptitude, obviously placed to elicit emotion from the viewer- emotion of a different sort- outrage- against the ruling party.

While I'm not defending any particular political party, I do find the situation appalling. Gone are the days of Doordarshan, when the only shots of a flood we would see were aerial, and some fleeting glimpses of land, or rather, water. While those reports left us craving for more, the present state of affairs leave us shuddering. Is there no happy medium?

Speaking of happy medium, the Pongal programs (Jan 14) on Sun TV were much publicized, and were upbeat to a large extent. Understandable, for a region that is trying to limp back to normal. Now, one permanent fixture of these special programs is the "Patti Manram,” a humorous debate on day-to-day topics. While this year's topic was pretty innocuous, whether relatives added to your happiness or not, one of the jokes did leave me stupefied.

"My wife was on the phone with someone," the debater said. "On finishing her call, I asked her who it was, and she said that the tsunami was coming. I later figured out my sister was coming home." This joke had the audience in splits, but I wasn't humored.

Perhaps this is part of the healing process, I thought.

Later on, I questioned whether there might be a deeper malignancy - that of dispathy. The victims were largely fisherfolk, who had little or no direct interaction with the middle-class. While people further away from the coast do feel very sorry for the people who perished, and enough to do something about it, after a point, tragedies do become points of academic debate and manifest themselves in popular culture, as comments and sometimes, humor.

There was another factor to be considered too- were people overexposed to the tragedy, and constant gory footage of the affected, that they felt overwhelmed by it all? Perhaps humor was just a form of escape.

While 9/11 identified its villain, the tsunami's villain was venerated by the people, so what could be done? Just escape from it all, which is the basis of both healing as well as exacerbating wounds in the fatalist philosophy, prevalent in India.

Such philosophy may go to explain several other thorns in India's flesh, such as corrupt politicians. With the British, India had clearly identified the villain, physically, and they were distinct from themselves. So dealing with the malaise was that much easier. Needless to repeat, the malaise in Indian society was not just the British, but they probably helped band Indians together, sort of.

With independence came the notion of "we are the rulers." Venerated, the leaders were followed blindly through their various stances (rather, changes in them) and their slow and systematic destruction of the moral fiber of society has been easily explained by fatalism. People feel helpless, and popular culture does nothing more than comment or joke upon it.

Maybe it’s time for a dictator to rule India, to be the "other" to get rid of! To cleanse India of Her unscrupulous elements, sacrificing him/her in the process. As the Chinese emperor of Qin says in the Jet Li movie “Hero” explaining why he is a dictator, "Our Land (to keep it together)."

(I don’t seriously mean it,of course!)