Play

What does the Supreme Court of India’s verdict on the right to privacy mean for us, beyond the legalities involved?

A video podcast series titled You Know What aims to start conversations on this and other subjects. In the first episode hosted by author Sachin Garg, the topic of privacy is broken down by Priya Malik, who has been a contestant on the reality show Bigg Boss, and Parijat Sarkar, a stand-up comedian.

“People generally gravitate towards easy information and do not bother to authenticate what is being told to them,” the host Sachin Garg told Scroll.in. “The idea is to get different people from different walks of life and talk about things that influence us.”

Panelist Priya Malik begins by stating that India is “almost enforcing” the Aadhar system. “You can be declared dead if the government wants to,” she points out. “You can be switched off, and if you’ve seen Black Mirror, you should know what that feels like.”

Malik goes on to talk about her experiences as a contestant on Bigg Boss, and how the idea of privacy plays out there. She assured that reality shows like Bigg Boss is not “scripted”, as the popular myth goes, but it is “heavily edited”. She explains how her experiences on Big Brother Australia were different from its Indian counterpart, in that the former had cameras installed inside washrooms too.

The panel also talks at length about the craft of stand-up comedy, and how sometimes artists have to let go of any boundaries of privacy and put themselves out there by performing bits that are drawn from their own personal experiences. Malik also describes her experience of being cyber-stalked by a co-passenger in a share cab while she was travelling in Mumbai.

The format of a video podcast gives room for free-flowing opinions and personal anecdotes. “Had I chosen any other format, I would not have been to explore so many different angles to the privacy debate,” said Garg.