Zee News, like a leading soap character, has been reborn. In its new life, it invites us to contemplate (it, we presume). ‘Zara sochiye’ it pleads — provocative but insulting to our intelligence as well since it suggests we, and not they, were thought-less and mindlessly watching them. Zara sochiye, Zee, what’s there to think about your Monday Manthan which describes how the gods remain cool in summer (with chandan, naturally, but any fool would know that, right?)

Zee says it’s now an all new Zee. Its colour combination certainly is: pale blue, with vanilla yellow, and a bit of black (like News X). Cool, yes. New? The next equally visible change is Prasun Bajpai as chief anchor and mentor, there to make us think as of Thursday night. He delivered a long and very likely, sagacious lecture on the grey matter between our ears, in chaste Hindi, momentarily forgetting that he was on the channel which invented Hinglish. A decade after that mix-up, we’re unable to comprehend anything that isn’t English, every second word. Zara think, Prasun.

There followed a lengthy report intended to make us do that. Political parties allegedly injure, maim and amputate rival party members in Kunoor without a second thought. This was a ‘khulaasa’ (‘yeh khulaasa nahin hai’ insisted Prasun so often, methinks he protests too much) that didn’t illuminate anything but blurred parts of the body that were injured, maimed or amputated. We were startled. Not merely by the condition of the injured but that this is what we were being asked to think about — was this new? Was it topical? Where was the substantive, supporting evidence?

If we think about it (which is more than it deserves), we’d be worried. Seems a somewhat sensational effort to appropriate ‘mind space’ on flimsy grounds. Song and dance we’re accustomed to and know better than to take seriously. This, we don’t know how to react. Zara sochiye, Zee.

And while you are about it, perhaps, your transformation could contain fewer commercial breaks during news bulletins — and more substance? On Sunday afternoon (2.22 pm), there was one news item for every ten ads. The same evening at 8.30 pm there was an ‘Exclusive’ — goodie, some food for thought (well, it was dinner time!). The only insight was of Kareena Kapoor’s legs and Saif Ali Khan’s body, in the throes of a ... dance.

NDTV 24x7 has also changed its studio look — less of that startling red and yellow, more bluesy-pink and lavender. Obviously, it’s the season of change. It also has the distinction of providing an entirely new genre of reconstructions. Since footage of the ‘Harbhajan slaps Sreesanth’ incident has been the best kept secret the BCCI has ever kept, TV has to imagine the incident. NDTV gave us a graphic sketch that saw Harbhajan strike Sreesanth, backhanded with his arm straightened out. That seemed possible if he was double jointed at the wrist — otherwise, bad sketch.

Have you watched the Barclays ad with the lovely catch line, ‘She’s my gal, she’s my gal’? Lovely, except that if we were Hillary Clinton, for one, we’d want to know why the pocket personal secretary couldn’t have been serenaded with, ‘he’s my guy, he’s guy’?

Lastly, recommend everyone who wants to — and can — think to watch Imagination (BBC World). Sunday saw a long, leisurely but knowledgeable investigation into, no, not maimed men, but Vincent Van Gogh’s sunflower paintings. What’s the equivalent of unputdownable for TV? Now, let me think...

shailaja.bajpai@expressindia.com