MTV Roadies 5: It's Back to the Asylum

The new season of MTV Hero Honda Roadies 5 is back and the auditions began airing on the channel for some weeks now. It’s Nikhil Chinappa and Raghu Ram who are back as judges distressing the poor kids into submission in the Torture Cell as it’s famously called. To give you an example from a recent episode, a candidate was asked to act like a monkey and the guy took the word so seriously, the next thing the judges knew he was pouncing on their table, discarding the sheets of paper and dropping the objects all around. Phew! he sure came closer to being sent to an asylum or a zoo at that point. On the other hand, you can bet that the anti-censorship lobby of the media would love to watch this show. No matter how many cuss words are beeped out by the channel (which is meant for the family), one can still make out the language being used from the lip movements (which need to be blurred on screen as well). It’s evident how hypocritical our censorship rules are which are so starkly displayed on television every week, it would put even the sleazy film directors and dialogue writers of Bollywood to shame.

I acknowledge that I derive some irrational fun from the show. It’s a feeling similar to when one gets in a space whilst watching 2 hunks slugging it out on the mean Mumbai street and the rest of the crowd just stands there watching. It’s an empathetic feeling of not being in that sorry position like the two fighting men and yet participating in the proceedings in a sadistic way which is safer from a distance. I can laugh, I can swear at them and I can empathise which is more important than the rest of the excuses. The abrasiveness of the judges, the contemptuous language with which the candidates are addressed; it’s surpising that the registrants have not filed a police complaint for mistreatment on the show which is watched by thousands if not millions every week. And yet, there is such a mad rush to become a “Roady” that many are willing to undergo the brutality of the reality show.

The desperation of becoming an overnight celebrity had pushed one gentleman from the Delhi audition rounds to fake a blind person which was so pitiful and disgusting. He even turned up for the Jaipur round despite being caught and rejected previously and this time he was manhandled and thrown out of the premises. Good riddance I thought and for once even the judges seemed to have shared my opinion.