I haven't come across an Indian household which is an exception to the fact that half of the members are devout followers of the K-Soaps churned out by Balaji Telefilms and the other half devout critics of the very same K-Soaps churned out by Balaji Telefilms.
This article of mine is not about criticizing Ekta Aunty Ke Fundey(as mentioned in the title), it is about glorifying the less-talked facets of The Queen of Indian Television(ahem!). As they say, Love her or Hate her, you just can't ignore her. I am not going to ignore her(otherwise I won't be able to continue with the article). I am not going to love her, neither am I going to hate her. I am just going to put forward a few Krazy(!) facts abut Ekta Aunty which you might not have observed and for which she must be applauded.
Here we go!
1. Take into account the employment that she has generated. Right now she might be having some 25-odd serials running on air. For each of these 25 serials she needs a lot of people - cameramen to capture the same scene from 6 different angles, video editors to repeat each scene thrice, sound mixers to add effects every time the camera hovers nonchalantly(and to add songs from Tusshar Kapoor's movies whenever possible), make-up men to make a 20 year old actress look like a 80 year old grandmother(after three 20-year jumps), two female artists essaying villainous roles, one female artist essaying the girl-next-door role, one male artist who essays a negative role for the first two seasons and positive role for the next two seasons(after which he is killed), and dozens of never-before-seen faces so as to add a "fresh look" to the serial every time the TRP's are dipping.
2. The sales of Saree's and Gold Jewelry have spurged tremendously. You may often find your neighbour's mother talking things like "Look at my Bindi, it was worn by Ramola Sikand when she killed Shaina", "This Necklace was worn by Tulsi when Mihir was brought back", etc.. Work for the designers of Sarees and Jewelery has certainly become easier, as they needn't think of path-breaking ideas in order to boost their sales. All they need to do is to follow Ekta Aunty's funday's regularly so that when a particular lady demands a particular set(mostly an expensive one) worn by a particular Vamp or a specific costume(mostly a heavy one) worn by a specific daughter-in-law, they'll have it in their store.
3. Discrimination on the basis of gender has decreased. If you read our ancient texts, you'll find out that our women were depicted as the ones with good character, values, etc.. In more than 99.99% of the cases the demons and destructors happened to be men. It was depicted as if women worked towards the betterment of society, whereas men did the reverse(I don't need to cite an example, there are hoards of them). Which isn't true, as we all know how girls actually are(I better put on my helmet, I am going to receive a lot of sandals soon). Our Ekta Aunty has worked in favour of us humiliated guys, as if you watch any of her serial you'll find out that women destroy families, take revenges from their own in-laws, are the root of all evil, etc., which is actually true(I may have to go underground for writing this, my female colleagues aren't going to spare me).
4. Work has become easier for the Indian News Channels. Now instead of presenting news in the mould of high standards set by CNN and BBC, all of them show the same news at the same time, and whenever an important event occurs they discard the old news item and keep on showing the same piece on and on for days. Even so, when advertisement comes on one channel, it comes on the other channels as well.
5. Astrologers and Numerologists. They can never remove the burden of success that they owe to our dear Aunty. Because of her, their business has increased, with even small kids saying "Mummy Mummy I want to become an Astrologer when I grow up!". Astrologers have started offering courses like "How to make use of the letter K" and "How to insert vowels without sounding silly"(they do sound silly, and we all know that). If this continues, parents might give their children names like Aashha, Eiesha, Mookeish, and Kkkkiran(Shah Rukh Khan would have loved this name!).
6. Unity. Despite the religion, caste, creed, whatever but not the gender, people of all age groups unite when the topic of discussion is Ekta Aunty. The males will go on bashing our dear Aunty, whereas the ladies will go on raving about how the new daughter-in-law in a particular serial is or how good was her mother-in-law's Kanjeevaram Saree(a few so called high class ladies, who feel that Aunty's fundey are too middle class, won't indulge in the discussion).
After reading the above, you must have realised how grossly underestimated is the lady with the K. We must unite and hail her tremendous efforts. She has done so much for all of us, we must give her something as a token of appreciation.
So, come on, shout with me "EKTA AUNTY, OOOOOOOOOOOOOO, JAI MATA DI LET'S ROCK!"(Oops, I guess this is what happens when all the Music Channels show the same Himesh Reshammiya's songs all the time, perhaps inspired by Ekta Aunty's fundey).
