The Government has survived, and India has gone back to watching its favourite TV soaps. The trust vote debate, after all, was a welcome break from the daily dose of aggrieved women in joint families. Because, for the vast majority of Indians, it was just an enjoyment reality show. Today, for a very significant part of the nation, the primary aim in life is entertainment. Something fundamental changed, the year an NCAER consumer survey found that the first consumer durable young couples were buying was no longer the refrigerator, but the TV.

Amusement-seeking behaviour now cuts across all demographics. Our children are ignorant of Indian history — or any history for that matter — but are living-breathing wikipedias on Akon and Mylie Cyrus. But why only children? A top Hindi film star carrying the Olympic torch through the streets of Delhi, when asked who started the Olympics, guessed gigglingly: “Hitler?” Poor thing, she forgot to wiki. No one anymore knows the difference between “it’s” and “its”. And if the two had any hope left of not being confused constantly like lost-and-found twins, the SMS jackboot crushed it. Our general knowledge extends to knowing there are several Indians in the Forbes top 10 billionaire list, and all this, coupled with the belief that we are the hottest IT nation in the history of civilisation, makes us all, to use writer Michael Lewis’ memorable phrase, “big swinging dicks”. We are rocking.

In the Western media, a company like Infosys and Wipro is always referred to as an “outsourcing company”, not as a “software company”. There’s a big difference.

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