Being a journalist I was a regular visitor to the Ramlila Maidan during social activist Anna Hazare’s indefinite fast for a strong anti-graft bill in Delhi’s Ramlila Maidan last month.
No doubt, huge crowds were always present at the site since day one as people kept on pouring as the word spread that a 74-year-old was fasting for the cause of the common man.
However, it was the rapid increase in the he number of nautankis that thronged the venue as each day passed.
Donning fancy dresses or imitating some mythological character these nautankis were spread across the length and breadth of the ground carefully trudging close to the cameras of 24X7 news channels hoping to get their 15 seconds of fame.
In some cases, these nautankis were even followed around by ‘supporters’ of Hazare who instead of protesting along with Hazare seemed to be only interested in getting themselves registered by a news crew as they walked behind and danced around a complete stranger read nautanki.
On the other hand these nautankis had a competition among themselves. Who was dressed the most outrageous and who could gather maximum eyeballs and most important—media attention.
Almost all of them had no idea about the Lokpal or the Jan Lokpal bill but each one of them had huge colourful posters which basically thrashed the likes of Manmohan Singh, Sonia Gandhi, Kapil Sibal and P. Chidambaram.
The rapid sales of tri coloured caps, flags etc. further cemented this statement as the more u were covered in tri-colours the more ‘patriotic’ you were and the better the chances of you been covered by a camera.
A particular incident further convinced me that Indians can stoop to any level just to put up a good show for others.
I was startled when a middle aged lady went up to a young boy who had a very creative anti-corruption poster in his hands and she asked him to sell it.
So, the only chance of her getting into the frame of a camera was with a nice, creative poster as she forgot to buy the tri-coloured stuff mentioned above.
In a similar incident, two toddlers on a carpet under the marquee were holding the Indian flags and broke into impromptu slogan raising, imitating the crowd around them.
They looked so cute engrossed in their worlds poking each other and just having good fun.
So, when this foreign photo journalist tried to click them, almost immediately a total stranger standing nearby rushed to the kids snatched a tri colour from one of them, held it himself and started posing with the kids.
The journo asked him to move and leave the kids alone as she wanted a natural shot but the guy wont’ budge. Finally, the lady stomped her foot and left without taking a picture.
It was so pathetic that at the end of it I couldn’t help but think that those people were just hungry for some footage. If they had been dumped in a ground with an assurance that their antics would be shown on national TV they would have indulge in similar behaviour, Anna or no Anna!
