Though I have been an avid consumer of all sorts of media, I never seriously looked at them from a child’s perspective. Now, with a five- month baby who is fascinated by any screen or newspaper, I have started wondering about his media choices as he grows up. Currently all he thinks of is eating the newspaper or the screen. But eventually these will form the fodder for his mind, as all media does. So what is the appropriate age for him to watch TV? What should he watch? When can he watch films, what kind of films, what books should one allow him to read?
The dilemmas of a parent have hit me. So has the realisation that the media market for children is underserved. Take the three largest segments of the media business in India — print, television and films. Of these, print is by far the most adult- dominated category. If you look at newspapers and magazines, it is about information, entertainment or news for you and I. Most children’s magazines come and go. And the kids’ section in newspapers usually has puzzles or pieces on education. There is little on the issues that kids could face — bullying, study -related problems, or even parents themselves.
The book publishing business is the only one that takes kids seriously. There is lots of variety in games, fiction and non-fiction. What is missing? Languages. Where are the good children’s books in Marathi or Hindi (the languages I speak) or in any other Indian language? In an English-dominated global economy, my big fear as a parent is that my kid will never know an Indian language.
While there are no estimates, let us assume that book publishing brings a decent slice of revenues from books targeted at kids. But we are in 2009, so books may not have the same hold over children that they had for, say, for my generation. Television and films have a bigger hold over children now. (You could argue that much depends on the quality of parenting, but that is another debate.)
On TV, the inevitable Cartoon Network, Pogo, Disney et al comprise the lion’s share of kid’s viewership. The kids’genre, as defined by TAM, has doubled its share of TV viewership across India from 2.7 per cent in 2004 to 5.4 per cent in 2008. This refers only to channels that define themselves as those for kids, not the kids’ shows on, say, Star Plus or Zee. Nor are there any estimates on how much of adult TV kids consume. In a market dominated by single-TV homes, chances are your toddler is watching the same news or soaps that you are watching.
When it comes to films, the scene is particularly pathetic. The last full-length feature films made for kids were Makdee and The Blue Umbrella, both by Vishal ‘Kaminey’ Bhardwaj. In case you want to point to Taare Zameen Par, it was meant more for parents who keep pushing their children.
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Animation flicks, such as My friend Ganesha or Hanuman come up once in a while. In a market where parents go to any lengths to indulge their child, it is odd that multiplexes aren’t full of films for children during Diwali or summer holidays.
For a country with legendary procreative abilities — we are the world’s second most populous country with a birth rate that is that is three times that of most developed countries — why aren’t the options wider or the market bigger?
One reason could be that kids by themselves may be the consumers of media but the decision very often, at least till they are 12-13 years old, rests with parents. Not only because parents pay the bills, but also because they are supposed to be the best judges of what is suitable for kids. Do parents’ tastes then restrict the choices that the market offers?
Maybe they do. If so, then we need to start looking at the world through a kid’s eyes. That is when we will demand more from the media targeted at them.
The writer is a media consultant vanitakohli@hotmail.com