Rajya Sabha complains about Bigg Boss: Have they nothing better to discuss?

The House of Elders is very upset, and not for reasons you would guess. The Upper House of our Parliament, the venerated Rajya Sabha, has been awfully busy discussing matters of national import. So have they been discussing how women are being treated improperly or the crumpling of the moral fibre of the nation? No siree.

Steel yourselves. The national issue that has been perturbing the wise MPs nominated for being the glorious intellectual jewels in our democracy’s crown – cue drumroll – is Bigg Boss. And not just Bigg Boss, but also Brit adventurer and TV host’s Bear Grylls’s show. You see, these shows are against Indian values.

Samajwadi Party’s Vishambhar Prasad Nishad, who is very disturbed by this upheaval of Indian values, asked the Information and Broadcasting Minister, “There is one show which has cameras filming women bathing in open. In another show, Man v/s Wild, there is a man eating insects. Have you taken any action against them?”

Someone please be kind enough to point out to Mr Nishad that when you watch a channel such as Discovery, there is a high possibility that you will “discover” naked tribes bathing in the open. There’s nothing indecent about it. Maybe he’d like to trek to Andamans and hand out sarees to the tribes there. Or do something about ​our bare-chested and barely clad politicians who take a dip fully clothed in the Ganga and ​blind us with their indecent exposure. ​

As for eating of insects, why not take Nishad on a holiday through the Northeast or South East Asia, where eating insects – pupa larvae, ants, hornets – is a delicacy. (They taste a lot like meaty chakli or murukku, in case you were wondering.)

But Nishad wasn’t through. “There are shows which are against morals…they show multiple marriages, indecency, violence … Is there any evaluation of its bad effects on common people and children?” he asked. Instead of shouting him down, others chimed in. Congress’s Vijaylaxmi Sadho said, “Every day, bad things are shown in the show Bigg Boss. What is the government doing about it?” According to Republican Party of India’s Ramdas Athawale, there should be social and political discussions on shows like Bigg Boss. “Once they had called me to Bigg Boss as well, but my name was later withdrawn,” disclosed Athawale. “There is need to have some control on the reality shows. There must be some social and political discussions (in the shows)”.

Sour grapes aside, maybe Athawale should ask ex-Bigg Boss contestant and ex-Rajya Sabha MP and stellar misogynist, Sanjay Nirupam to have a word with the producers of Bigg Boss.

Karan Singh of Congress voiced a disclaimer first and said, “I do not watch these shows, but at times when we see it by mistake… there is lot of indecency. Young girls are made to dance, which is against our culture”.

Now, I have to agree with Karan Singh: watching young girls and boys dancing to “Munni Badnam Hui” and “Mein Tandoori Chicken Hoo” on various dance competitions shown on national TV is highly unpalatable. I don’t know whether it’s against Indian culture, but it certainly is in very poor taste and a sexual predator’s delight. Of course, one way to bring an end to these dance shows is to ask another Rajya Sabha MP, Mithun Chakravarty, to stop playing judge and grand master on these very same shows. Dear Mr Singh, you see, the rot lies within. If anything should be banned, it should be MPs participating in regressive and exploitative shows such as Dance India Dance.

Speaking of exploitation, let’s not forget that each minute of running the House costs Rs 2,50,000 of the tax payers’ money. Going by the number of questions asked, this discussion on morality on TV would have carried on for at least 20 minutes (I’m setting it at a conservative minimum), by which estimate Rs 40 lakh was spent by the Upper House on how awful Bigg Boss and Man vs Wild are. Way to go, elders. Is there really nothing more important to discuss?

There are far more damaging blows to the cultural fibre of India and a lot of them are nurtured in places like the Rajya Sabha. For instance, an ordinary citizen knows that even if you’re accused of rape, if you have friends in high places, not only can you walk free, you can also become an MP (or even a Cabinet Minister). MLAs ​ watch porn in the Assembly  and ​ our MPs usually end up screaming and shouting like hooligans when they’re supposed to be having calm, collected and constructive debates. Male MPs make vile sexist remarks to other MPs and frequently when such comments are made to women, they get away with a mild reprimand – if that.

So the MPs should worry not. Given a choice between Man V/s Wild and Bigg Boss on one hand, and watching Parliamentary proceedings on the other – the latter definitely wins in the contest of what is more unpalatable, indecent and damaging to the common Indian imagination.

To give the devil its due, other questions were also tabled that day such as the utilisation of funds for NHRM, RBI guidelines for local service payments, whether the government has discovered a cross-border tunnel on the LoC, the challenges faced by Ayurveda, tax exemption to corporate and big business houses, and the promotion of health farming.

And to give the I& B Minister of State his due, he did say that the government can issue advisories to the channels, but “the government does not want to impinge on the freedom of expression. Keeping in mind the morality, keeping in mind the decency, keeping in mind the various levels of acceptance on television, certain guidelines have been issued”.

Yay to that.