Dangerous Ishq Starring Aamir

Arnab Goswami and Rahul Kanwal reduced to starry-eyed fan boys. Only one man could make them weak in the knees!

WrittenBy:Aastha Manocha
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Satyamev Jayate hit the airwaves and successfully tugged at people’s heartstrings this Sunday. But it was the deference with which news channels treated its host in the prime-time interviews aired in the days leading up to the show which was noteworthy. And that too for a programme that was going to step into their territory. To be fair, they ostensibly didn’t know that Aamir Khan was going to take up social issues in the hour-and-a-half marathon.

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Two interviews of Aamir were telecastover the weekend, on Frankly Speaking with Arnab on Times Now and Hot Pursuit with Rahul Kanwal on Headlines Today. What we got from the actor were little teasers about his show – it’s going to have music and drama but it’s not an entertainment show, it’s going to be informative but it’s not a quiz show. We already knew that from the promos! It seemed a game of “guess what I’m thinking” as Khan talked about his show without revealing anything.

An earlier interview had been conducted by film and entertainment journalist, Rajeev Masand on CNN-IBN on May 1st. One assumed that Arnab Goswami and Rahul Kanwal would ask more hard-hitting questions, or question Aamir on his convenient media appearances and reason behind doing this show. But no such luck.

A dazed Arnab Goswami discovered in Frankly Speaking that Khan was keeping his cards close to his chest. Also, it was quite a let down to see Newshour’s angry host go so quiet around Aamir. To be fair, he did grill him a little but only in regard to the actor’s criticism of the media in earlier articles and interviews. Goswami seemed to have taken Khan’s scathing comments to heart as he quoted the 2006 Tehelka article in which the notorious perfectionist had, in his interviewer’s words, “ranted against the media”. Oh Aamir, how could you? Rarely have we seen Goswami look so dismayed by anyone or anything.

Goswami then went on to say that Peepli Live,produced by Aamir Khan, was as much a satire on the media as it was on the plight of farmers. Bringing the Banda rape case into the conversation Arnab stated that the accused was put in jail thanks to the media’s ‘loud’ intervention.Say, Mr Goswami, has anyone bothered to look at how the case is progressing since then?

Of course, Khan was asked the three questions every news channel found most pressing -how the show was conceived, whether he is guilty of ‘selective activism’ andwhether he planned to get into politics. Times Now didn’t mention Sachin’s Rajya Sabha seat while asking about Khan’s political plans. Rahul Kanwal decided to go all coy on Hot Pursuit and mention a Rajya Sabha seat without naming names and asked Aamir whether he’d accept a RS nomination. But on the almost identical Seedhi Baat on Aaj Tak, he straight-up named Tendulkar.

A very eager Kanwal asked questions whose answers would showAamir in a flattering light. For example, a question onreports that Aamir has asked his sponsors to pull advertising from the 11 am slot, giving Aamir just the right opening to state yet again that he wasn’t doing any more endorsements. It’s not a logical decision, Khan pointed out, it’s “emotional”. Much like the two anchors, who seemed to be getting as love-struck as permissible while conducting an interview on television.

Aamir Khan has no doubt proven himself to be an able manipulator of an ever-eager media who is so starved of interviewing him that they swing between asking him non-controversial questions, to looking at him in a star-struck manner. But one does wonder if he ever tires of giving stock answers to almost all news channels and not just the two mentioned above. In case you missed any of the interviews, his stock responses to the stock questions are listed below:

  • The idea of the show came about when Uday Shankar, the head of Star, came to him with an idea of a game show which Aamir wasn’t interested in. So Shankar asked the star to think of something himself and after around 6-8 months of research this is what the crusading actor came up with.
  • He didn’t follow through with his campaigning for the Narmada Bachao Andolan, neither did he turn up at Anna Hazare’s Mumbai campaign despite being present for it in Delhi, because he is “not a full time activist”, but an “entertainer”. Nevertheless, as a citizen he supports an anti-corruption law and so has written to the PM and his local MP, Priya Dutt- whom he referred to by first name – on Frankly Speaking.
  • He doesn’t want to join politics, as he thinks that the field is not for him and he won’t be able to contribute as much as he can while being outside the political system.
  • The shooting of the program was so draining that the entire Satyamevteam is now very “brittle” and should all go in for some “group therapy”. (Repeated verbatim on both programs.)

You do have to hand it to the news anchors, though. They managed to create and conduct 30-minute interviews without Aamir revealing anything about his new show! He wanted the audience to get an “undiluted” experience. Seems like everybody won but the viewers, who had to wait till Sunday to finally find out what the programme was about.

The author can be reached at aastha@small-screen.com

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