Driven by the idea that the content of the YouTube channel has to resonate with ‘what is happening in the country,” Culture Machine, a digital media entertainment company founded by Sameer Pitalwalla and Venkat Prasad in 2013 with Ayushman Gupta as the Channel Director, started 'Being Indian' an open platform which isn’t just aspirational but is also Indian in its observation. “The check boxes for my channel surely have ‘Indian’ and ‘observational’; the rest just follows, to bring about the real look of what is happening in the country. The genre and treatment is pure Indian narrative,” says Ayushman clearly defining the purpose behind the YouTube channel ‘Being Indian’.
This is not to say it’s all serious and nationalistic. Being Indian team describes itself as the ‘Best of Indian Humour, Amazing Indians, Jugaads, News, Videos and a lot more’ on their Facebook page, but Ayushman says, “We are not an ‘inspired’ channel like others; most channels and shows on TV are designed on a format copied from elsewhere; we didn’t want to be known that way. That’s why we have our own stories and we have consciously decided not to make fun of others. Also unless it is a man-made disaster, we do not take sides.”
The channel gets the youth talking and responding to current issues in the country, in a bid to capture the voice of the people on the street and get their pulse right. Armed with a masters degree in film and TV direction from Pune, Ayushman likes to take up burning issues to throw light on the opinions of the aam junta . One such show that got a good number of hits was when MIM party president Asaduddin Owaisi said he would never say ‘Bharat Mata Ki Jai.’ While the rest of the country engaged in a heated debate and called members of a community racist, Being Indian decided to show the Indian in every Indian, irrespective of their language or religion.
“Let facts open our eyes and not debates. Northeast is neglected but when we got an opportunity to be there, we saw they are as Indian as we are. The customs, language, dress, looks, food everything differs within the state, but yet the emotions are same. A friend who is also a poet beautifully brought all of it out through a little poem. That is how we tend to give voice to local stories. As Indians we need to know each other and that is what we do,” explains Ayushman. The channel recently released their film on Arunachal Pradesh with a description voice over in the form of a poem.
As for how the channel has been received, Ayushman says, “The love we get cannot be quantified. There are official trolls who sign up on every YouTube channel; we deal with these professional trolls with love.”
Being Indian in Hyderabad
When the team was in Hyderabad, they were surprised to see the stark contrast between the Old city and the new city. “By new city I mean Hitec, Gachibowli and Jubilee Hills areas. Old city is charming because of the people, their sense of humour and their language. They do a stand-up comic act in their daily lives effortlessly and all of their sarcasm-laced talk comes with a lot of deep thought. In all this we somehow missed taking a look at Secunderabad which apparently is another section of population with its own characteristic. Hyderabad is a clear example of the diversity that our country talks of. If I ever have to shift cities, I know it will be to the city of Nizams,” says Ayushman.
