Oprah Winfrey, the 57 year old American TV celebrity, visited India. She can be the special guest here due to her celebrity quotient (!!) but entire Bollywood community right from actor Amitabh to director Madhur Bhandarkar have turned like jokers in honoring her. Even the great lady writer Shobhaa De got titillated seeing her presence in India. Even the political celebrities like Shashi Tharoor had swung his tail for this lady.
Oprah Winfrey is known just for high class urban crowds who follow international channels. She is an American media proprietor, a talk show host, an actress and finally a philanthropist. But that doesn’t mean she deserves national attention.
When the biggies like Amitabh took her to his home giving a public tweet, "The gracious Oprah Winfrey visits our home, to meet us and bless the baby..warm hearted, endearing .. drive her to party in her honor”, entire media including the regional channels made big hue and cry about her.
Even the people those never heard of her name found it shame for letting out their ignorance of not knowing her. Hence every body in media started blowing trumpet for her.
Well, India is known for hospitality. But this is not the way the nation stoops down for a normal foreign tourist. A few months ago, our celebs did similar hungama when Lady Gaga visited India. In fact, our Amitabh or Shashi Tharoor or Shobhaa De hardly gets such a welcome when they go to USA, from celebs there.
Just see how Shashi Tharoor, Shobha De and Madhur Bhandarkar tweeted for Oprah’s arrival in India:
Shashi Tharoor: “With Oprah Winfrey at the Godrejs. Amazing lady, showing no signs of jetlag &looking great in a sari!”
Shobhaa De: “Oprah conquers Mumbai!SRK tells her she is the biggest star in India. Country's A-list queues up for pics with sari-clad celeb.O is WOW!”
Madhur Bhandarkar: “Met Oprah winfrey an awesome woman,spent an unforgettable magical evening in her presence !”
As long as we Indians lose our self pride and stoop down to this extent when seeing a foreigner/American, we are considered down by our own conscience. Well, celebs may invite her to their homes and honor her. But promoting her on public platform is something unwanted.
Who knows Oprah Winfrey may comfortably take away a Bharat Rathna if she stays back in India for a month. Yes, our Bollywood jokers are capable enough of influencing our headless government in this regard. Even Mother India loves honoring someone from West!!!
It's not a dire need for nation to know who Oprah is.
Hence Ram Gopal Varma tweeted in right satirical manner, “Is Oprah Winfrey a fish? Just asking becos the name rhymes with pomfrey”.
Abdul Rasool ([email protected])
Hyderabad
Photo Courtesy: NDTV
Disclaimer: The views expressed in the article are the author's and not of greatandhra.com.
