TV and social obligations

Talking of Television there are clearly two divisions in the Indian context. On one side there is the state-owned Doordarshan (DD) and on the other the herd of satellite TV channels. The distinction off course is in the roots. DD have been traditionally serving as the mouth-piece of the ruling party and their filthy purpose. But if you could ignore this motive you can clearly say that there still a lot of programming that DD does which satellite channels cannot even think of leaping into. Can you imagine watching a program for framers like "Krishi Darshan", or "National Program of Dance" on a satellite TV channel. I am precisely talking about the social obligations of mass-media.

For satellite TV channels the compulsions are obvious. In the race for TRP and revenues you have no other option but to run-rerun saas-bahoo tear jerkers and those raunchy remix videos. Doordarshan after all has the luxury of grants and subsidies and what not. Still after the advent of Prasaar Bharti even DD has to earn its bread and you can clearly see the shift in focus as my favorite vrind-gaan and teleplays bite the dust. Thank goodness though, some good ness may still be left in DD.

One of the recent programmes that I liked and which has been immensely popular is the award winning thriller Jasoos Vijay that concentrates on AIDS awareness and issues related to gender-discrimination. Funded by BBC and NACO, the producers have roped in Om Puri as the anchor. The format is very interactive, targeted at the rural audience and viewers can even win pries by guessing the criminal. What is I like about the serial is the right mix of entertainment and education. In the backdrop of the adventure and masala the message is conveyed in a candid-local lingo. An interesting aspect of the serial is the central detective character, played by Khandakar Adil, who has been depicted as being HIV+ himself. As the story progresses with his love for Gauri the serial will deal with a touchy issue on the subject, should an HIV+ person given the right to marry. The serial has been dubbed in various regional languages and the recent buzz says that the series would now be shown in Thailand and Cambodia too.

If you like such serials there is another AIDS awareness program called Haath se haath mila, that takes young people on board two special buses that will travel to cities, towns and villages. Their primary aim would be to persuade people to use condoms. Kudos to the producers!