Society

Red Carpet For The Everyman

One Oscars. One Emmy. How is it that we are choked by a glut of glittering awards?

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Red Carpet For The Everyman
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And the award goes to...Majeed Pista House, Hyderabad! While cheery hoteliers from Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Pondicherry look on, Hyderabad revels in the glory amid a few envious glances. After all, we are talking about the South India Hospitality Awards. It picks hoteliers who deliver the highest standards of service to customers in segments such as these: best mineral water, best mid-day meal, best haleem, best budget hotel or best tiffin centre. An “utter rush of exhilaration” is how attendees describe the awards, while an elated M.S. Nagaraju, the managing director of Epi­curus, a luxury Hyderabad restaurant, calls it “sensitivity to hygienic food”.

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Turn left, you have the Olive Crown Awards; turn right, and the Golden Petal Awards heave into view. Self-con­gratulatory India seems to be bursting at the seams with the growing pile of awa­rds. Rajika Mittra, country head, Promax BDA and India Radio Forum, calls it the “apples and oranges syndrome”. “Earlier, there were only four-five premium awa­rds, but now regular life is flooded with accolades in different genres.” If Hollywood has one Oscars, Bollywood has a dozen clones clogging ent­e­rtai­n­ment channels. The Screen Awards, Zee Cine Awards, Stardust Awards, Filmfare Awards, Ujala Asianet Film Awards have handed over their statuettes. Coming up are iifa and Toifa. For every Emmy, there are scores of Indian TV awards.

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The MO is simple: announce an award, get a handful of film folks and other celebrities to endorse it, fly them all to an exotic locale to give the awards away and, to top it all, get involved in some social cause. Ranadeep Basu, CEO, Dream Show Experience, feels creating an award property is good business if you can market it well. “It’s a great platform to showcase your brand.” Bestowing an honour is one thing, but does it help the awardee in the long run? Subho Ray,  president, Internet and Mobile Asso­ciation of India, says, “The endorsement of an idea is a key factor. It helps the awa­rdee reach out to the jury if he needs support, which might even help him scale up.” You may call it bloated certit­ude, a glitzy brush with beg­o­w­ned sta­­­rdom on a heavily dec­ked-up, confe­tti-strewn podium, or an attempt to grab eyeballs. Whatever it may be, as a nation we don’t fall short of praises or prizes.

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