Shilpa and the great Indian middle-class

By now the whole world knows exactly how much money Shilpa Shetty is going to make, who her agent is, what her mother said and what her next career move is going to be.

But what everyone seems to have missed is one significant unquestionable conclusion that can be drawn from the whole exercise: that what we saw on Celebrity Big Brother were the representatives of the two dominating classes in Britain and India pitted against each other.

The powerful class in Britain today is its working class. It impacts its newspapers, its television networks and other popular media, and Jade Goody is one of its icons. It is — as we have witnessed — parochial, provincial, uneducated, globally unsophisticated, wholly comprised of yob-like elements and as a consequence — unemployable.

Shilpa Shetty on the other hand is an icon of the Indian middle-class — emerging as India’s most-significant bracket of people. And like millions of others in that class she is typical: articulate, intelligent, educated, dignified, globally sophisticated — and highly employable.

It is this class of Indians that has transfixed the world at the moment. And it is this class of Indian who is all set to conquer the world. Think about it — have you met anyone from India’s middle-class who does not have a college degree? Who is not articulate? Who does not have a set of skills that make them highly-employable? I doubt it.

The Indian middle-class is truly a thing of beauty and a joy forever in this respect. Everyday I come across its representatives and they never cease to amaze me. Bright-as-button young female brand managers, quick-thinking marketing executives, visionary entrepreneurs… the list is endless.

We are to a woman, sharper, brighter faster more articulate and more globally sophisticated — and consequently more highly-employable than any other middle class in the world today.

Much of this has to do with our proficiency in English, but a lot has to do with Indian middle-class values that lay so much store on education and degrees.

Aishwarya Rai for instance was training to be an architect before she became a beauty queen contestant and then an actress. I cannot think of too many actresses abroad who have specialised training in this manner.

Saif Ali Khan went to Winchester — compare that to the academic record of Leonardo DiCaprio or Tom Cruise. And Shah Rukh Khan was a star student from Delhi University!

So let’s not waste our time trivialising the whole Big Brother spectacle on matters of Shilpa being a flop Page Three actress or even on racism.

Instead let’s draw from it it’s deeper and more significant lesson: that we as Indians can walk in to any global situation with our intelligence, education, sophistication and grace under pressure — and win!

s_malavika@dnaindia.net