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When Gajendra Singh created Antakshri, a reality show, out of India’ home- grown favorite picnic and parlor game, in the year 1993, no one ever thought that one day such reality shows would be the life line of dipping TRPs of the TV channels which grew like anything in the past decade, more than 60 of them are just for news only. Surprisingly all are indigenous.

Singer from B- towns tried their luck in the yet another reality show Sa Re Ga Ma Pa in 1995. Then came the giant reality show- KAUN BANEGA CROREPATI (KBC). With Amitabh Bachchan as host, who was then a fading star, gambled through this show to re-establish himself in which he got a bumper success. It was this show which not only changed the host’s life but transformed Indian television, promising fame and fortune to the couch potatoes. The channel STAR PLUS, which aired KBC, was the channel # 1 with an audience of 22 million in 2001 which soared to 61 millions in the year 2005. The telecom servers were streamlined to confront a peak load of 4,000 SMSes per second traffic.

Making heroes out of nobodies, it was reality television boom which put mass into mass media. From 5 crore votes of first INDIAN IDOL finale, the response heaped to 7 crore in the third edition. With a reality show in almost every genre like singing (SAREGAMAPA), dance (JHALAK DIKHLA JA), comedy (GREAT INDIAN LAUGHTER CHALLENGE) and even for weight loss (BIGGEST LOSER JEETEGA).

It is reality shows countering the SAAS BAHU drama of the Indian television which has the maximum viewership. More and more format are being discovered and invented for reality shows. Some a made- in – India formats and many being licensed from abroad.

Now that India is waiting for a yet another generation of reality shows, broadcasters have scrubbed trade shows for the next big thing over the television. Even in the western countries, there is a critical situation in drama in the soap and successful shows have picked up reality television traits like THE OFFICE and LOST.