This season has been quite a ride, what with the constant flips, dramas, petty fights and all. As a result, my sentiments have changed for a lot of contestants in the past few weeks. But no one can match the love hate relationship I've formed with Arti.
The way she yells and makes a mountain out of a molehill is unbelievable. I still remember the little smile she had on her face after successfully instigating shukla against siddharth dey. It was adorable how she thought that shukla was avenging her honour. Nope! Women's respect in nowhere near Shukla's list of priorities.
Arti's love for the channel's star is anything but subtle and the way she supports him, by turning gaandhari is disgusting to watch at times. There is a lack of self respect (which she herself admitted in an UU), need for stability, a habit to meddle and a curiosity regarding what's going on with whom so that she can report it back and somehow contribute to the conversation with her 'friends' to be considered important!
This is her content. No game, just being herself, flaws and all!
And this is where she becomes somewhat relatable. Arti with her obsession with the mirrors, and pitiful tendency of people pleasing is very human. She looks like a doormat, yes. But aren't we all in some ways or the other?
The way she picks up a fight on the stupidest topic and screams about it is entertaining. The way she starts lecturing people about respecting and standing up for yourself, when her own game is dependent on another contestant is unintentionally funny.
And ofcourse, the way she starts contradicting her own statements regarding sidnaaz as per the situation is ...NOT amusing. It's very very irritating but since nobody takes her seriously, I end up laughing at it!
She has weaseled her way into my heart and while every week I wish Arti gets eliminated, I can genuinely not imagine the house functioning well without her!
The mystery here, which I should have started with but got lost within my feelings for arti, is that why isn't she out yet ?
There are 2 reasons I can think about for this.
Engagement
A show tries to generate the maximum engagement through advertisements and now social media. If people are curious, interested, outraged, disgusted or invested in the show, they will watch it. This means more trp and money! That is why PR activity is encouraged, be it negative or otherwise. It is like free advertisement.
Now constestants have their own bunch of loyal followers plus PR to generate interest. But Arti did not give anything to the show worth talking about!
This is where her celebrity status helps. Not only her family, which has an audience of it own, but their connections from the industry are appealing to their viewers about Arti. I saw a post by Bipasha Basu and KSG talking about the same. The latter even made an appearance on the show to offer some advice and love (which was not needed as such!)
People who don't even watch bigg boss will be curious enough to search about it. A small proportion might like it and start watching. This is what ends up increasing viewership.
So Arti is ultimately giving back to the show indirectly. And as I said, sentiments change. So people might have hated arti before, but now I am sure they prefer her over others like Pahira and jariwala.
The In-between
Arti bridges the communication gap between shukla and rashmi in her own way. She is visibly supporting the former, but since she is the mutual friend, she can listen to both without divulging too much and stop the narrative before it gets too ugly.
We might have seen only a snippet of their conversations, and I'm sure a lot of private affairs were kept out of the scenes where Arti was involved.
Also, Arti kinda becomes the guardian of sidnaaz. She is there with them most of the time, and there have been many instances where the woman has tried to clear the differences between the two.
She understands sidnaaz is toxic and definitely not the ideal relationship. But according to her its masti and timepass. All in good fun.
At times I feel that Arti is the supervisor of these two adults behaving like kids. She defends the bond when necessary, so that it does not come across as too vulgar, and encourages it at other times so that people see that their chemistry is real and worth rooting for.
Arti I feel is not someone who cares about winning. The way she declared shukla above everything after his and Asim's fight, spoke a lot about her role in the show. She has found a purpose in the game and is happy about it. When it ends...I think it will take her a long time to get over all of it.
Anyway, sorry for the long post. I don't think Arti deserves to be among the top 5, but she is such a complex personality that it is not easy to ignore her too! 😆 What do you guys think?
