Who will be Indian Idol 3?-Article

But has Indian Idol 3 got the two best singers in the finals? Season 3 of Indian Idol witnessed quite a few arguments between judges and mini-controversies like gender discrimination against girls, performance prevailing over singing, best singers getting eliminated and mediocre ones surviving on viewers' votes. The galas began with 13 contestants and in four weeks as many girls were voted out in a row which made the jury express concern over the disturbing trend in voting pattern. It was alleged that female contestants were being voted out because of voting public's gender bias against girls. But the trend did not stop there. In subsequent weeks singers like Charu Semwal, Deepali and Puja Chatterjee were also shown the door. Only Ankita survived and made it to the top five.

"Whenever I saw girls in the bottom four, it made me feel very sad. Indian Idol is a talent hunt and people should have voted on merit," says the hard-to-please music composer and judge Anu Malik. Sony's business head Albert Almeida feels that it's not only the gender bias that worked against female contestants. He explains, "Historically there has always been bias towards males. But then the boys on Indian Idol 3 were real good singers too. I think it's the combination of talent and bias that worked in the boys' favour. After all, when emotions come into play people tend to vote with their hearts rather than theirmind. But whatever may have been the initial trend, as the contest progressed it became an even competition between boys and girls." However, anchor Mini Mathur feels that girls were judged harshly by viewers. "Apart from singing, girls were judged on extra parameters like looks, hairstyle and clothes. But when it came to judging the boys, they were judged mainly by their singing," she adds.

Once the gender discrimination debate was over, the singer vs. performer issue took over. Ankita was said to have survived till the last four mainly on the strength of her dancing skills whereas a good singer like Emon had to worry because of his inability to perform while singing. A pertinent question was raised on the show: If talent hunt shows are all about finding good singers who could be potential playback artiste in future, is it fair to expect them to perform as well? The judges were divided in their views. Javed Akhtar emphasized that ideally the winner should be a good singer who can also perform and not the other way round, while Anu Malik was of the view that a good combination of singing and dancing makes a participant's journey to the victory post less arduous. Says Almeida, "Good singing is necessary but it is not enough for the contestants to get viewers' votes. People don't vote only for talent but look for other qualities like dancing and looks. The criteria for voting differ from people to people because they tend to vote from the heart and rationalize with mind later. The star quality that appeals to people is not the same in all cases."

Finally with Ankita's exit, singing did prevail. Emon walked into the top three of Indian Idol, only to be voted out the following week. Whether his journey to the victory post was affected because Javed kept on calling him a Sonu Nigam copy is anybody's guess, but by then Prashant's popularity in his hometown and the support he was getting from his colleagues in Kolkata police force was amply clear. So was Amit Paul's rising status as a potential Indian Idol candidate as well as growing popularity among women and the massive support he was getting from Shillong. Incidentally, the duo met during the Piano round of the show in Mumbai and became friends almost instantly. They have remained roommates and best buddies throughout the contest and are ironically pitted against each other in the finals. However, their friendship has not witnessed any acrimony.