It has been said earlier, been there done that. Period. But what? That capitalist enterprise with its fishing net is always on the prowl to ensnare the next big or small thing so as to make more money or, to put it in a sophisticated fashion, profit. So, if somebody has been sexually assaulted in a metropolitan city, it gives the leverage to some of the prominent news channels to organize week long panel discussions, hyper-sensitize the issue by ‘recreating’ the incident graphically through dramatization, gives an opportunity to filmmakers to make a film out of it, the opposition seems to walk away with the cake as it can disparage the ‘inefficient’ government and advertise their “feminist” side and interestingly, the sellers of pepper and chilli sprays and shock guns have something to rejoice about. Well, somebody’s pain is the others’ gain. Whether it’s a natural calamity or a national crisis, capitalism always channels its way to gulp down profit.
And, what is the new found enthusiasm of capitalism? No prizes for answering. It’s the Aam Aadmi. The ordinary citizen, the everyday people who wait at the bus stand accompanied by the cacophonous horns, who doesn’t shy away from bargaining for vegetables to mobile phones, who thinks that public property is our drawing room so let’s spit, urinate, dump garbage and assassinate civic sense, for whom being uncouth is ‘cool’ and protest only when the metro seat has been hijacked by the person standing next to you and overlook when somebody is being harassed irrespective of their gender, sexuality or age. But how does capitalism manage to churn profit out of it? Make the Aam Aadmi the brand new marketing strategy! Manufacture shoes to soaps that the aam aadmi of the nation can identify with because the aam aadmi is the target population. If empowerment and awareness is the philosophy of the moment, produce ads for the ‘thinking, awakened and enlightened audience’. So, you have ads where consuming a particular brand of tea bolsters your spirit to take on the corrupt political system or how a particular alcohol stands for the ‘real man’ who stands up for the cause of women. Ordinariness is not so ordinary any more. Being ordinary, being massy is the next step to being the cynosure. So you have songs like ‘Aam aadmi udaas hai lekin sab first class hai’. Going to the grassroots is the trend, so let’s turn organic. Organic food, organic fashion, organic art, organic everything, make organic lifestyle your identity. You have e-stores dedicated to organic vegetables and fruits, restaurants and pop-up stores organizing organic food festivals and fashion designers sending out the models on the ramp in organic clothes as an evidence of their eco consciousness.
Amidst this frenzied fervor, I won’t be surprised if ‘Jai ho’ strikes a chord with the audience apart from Salman Khan’s charisma for some and ‘mass-appeal’ for the rest. The plot in nutshell – it revolves around a ‘common man’s’ fight against the system! Now you know that the aam aadmi is here to stay (pun intended)!