When we and [V] had fun

Ashima Sehajpal Batish

It looked so good till it wasn’t given a makeover. And then, it became a case study in over-dressing, in cakey make-up, which turns patchy after a few hours. The uber-chic Channel V that was all about music and youth trends, turned into a warden who would keep reminding you that it’s a bad-bad world. That you must reach home on time. That you should have the inherent ability to doubt all around you. 

In the 1990s, Channel V was ‘us’. It imparted us first lessons in western music, gave us cues that it’s cool to have a crush on Backstreet Boys, Boyzone, Spice Girls, Enrique Iglesias, Ricky Martin… taught us what rap in Hindi is, courtesy the very original desi rapper Baba Sehgal. So when the ‘us’ music lovers of the 90s get to read that the channel is shutting down, nostalgia hits. And leaves us with a hangover!

Gaurav Kapur, VJ-turned-sports anchor is hungover too. He changed his career gear a decade back and Channel V now only finds a mention in his resume. “And then I got to know about the channel’s status that left me overwhelmed with memories. It made for a perfect example of creative freedom,” says Gaurav. There were no filters, no censors. It was the only channel that talked to you and not at you. “Our currency was imagination and our salary its tangible form. Madness was welcomed on the shows, the only constant underpinning being ‘make desi cool’.”

No wonder Lola Kutty was admired. Her silk sarees, curly sidelocks, gajra, bindi and the bespectacled look struck a complete contrast with the script she would stick to. All things traditional ended at her appearance, and all things witty began with her Malayali accent.  The talk show found a parallel narrative in Rendezvous with Simi Garewal. But how we loved the incoordination between how Lola looked and what she talked more than the complete package Simi Garewal was!

While Lola taught us the Malayali side of English, Manish Makhija introduced Haryanvi to our television language curriculum. His studio backdrop even qualified for a chapter on creative experiments. No swanky interiors, no plush couches… rather, we had Manish sitting on a cot, with a stick in one hand, a buffalo by his side. At the time when articulation began to be identified with English and style with what VJs wore, Manish spoke in Haryanvi, and sported a white kurta-pyjama. 

“And then we had him playing the latest English and Hindi songs. Every bit of The Udham Singh Show was so entertaining,” recalls Natasha Munjal, who rues its conversion from a music channel to a GEC (General Entertainment Channel). A fan of VJ Luke Kenny, she says it was V that introduced Indians to pop music. “It was a splitscreen between Madonna, All for One, Take That and Indian pop stars Alisha Chinai, Anamika, Shweta Shetty and Bali Sagoo. The progression from radio to television music channels couldn’t have been better.”

V was also the pioneer in introducing to us a reality show for youth. Though SaReGaMa and Meri Awaaz Suno were there when V launched the hunt, the difference was for all to see. Auditions for the first music band were held across India and the outpour even amazed the judges and organisers.

 “We were so ahead of the times. Even when nobody had thought of it, V gave India its first all-women band in 2002,” informs Purab Kohli, one of the judges of the reality show then. Viva, as it was called, made it to the Limca Book of Records for singing to a live audience of 50,000. 

“One of the best life experiences I have had was on V on the Run. We travelled the length and breadth of the country in two cars, shooting our journey and everything in between,” recalls Anushka Manchanda, one of the band-members, and now a popular playback singer. She adds that the experience set the tone of her life. “To travel, explore, meet new people, try new things, be fearless and free — it taught me how to be a liberated and independent woman in the true sense of the word.”

As it taught the ‘us’ of the 1990s to be free and liberated, to look at the world with a different perspective, it succumbed to the TRP pressure. The music channel became everything that it wasn’t supposed to be. “It started running daily soaps, crime shows… Even if one wanted to watch that, there were ample go-to channels. The USP of V — music and youth trends — was compromised,” adds Purab. It was reduced to another GEC, chasing TRPs, while letting go of its audience.

It let go of ‘us’ and now we have to let go of V.