New career option for girls

15 October, 2008

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The enormous expectation of easy money has been fuelled by the hundreds of song and dance TV reality shows in Hindi as well as in the language channels. This has suddenly made girls realise their potential. They have learnt to exploit the situation

POST IPL, a new career option has surfaced on the horizon – this is the cheer girls and cheer leaders. It is reported that the troupes of Indian cheer girls earned around Rs 2 lakhs each for their performances in the last season of the IPL. The amounts collected by foreigners must have been considerably more because they have the expertise to extract their dues from organisers. To them it is just another assignment. For Indian girls, coached by a renowned dancer of Bollywood, it was the beginning of a new phase in their lives.

The enormous expectation of easy money has been fuelled by hundreds of song and dance TV reality shows in Hindi as well as in the language channels. This has suddenly made the girls realise their potential. They have learnt to exploit the situation and are not worried about the surprises that they might cause. To them it is the newest way of life where the moon is there for the asking provided one is ready to compromise. At times, the compromise is on lifestyles, or on their ongoing studies. They are encouraged by their parents and guardians because the realization has crept in that making money is not really a difficult matter. The catch is that one should be willing to let down one’s hair.

Coming to the new career option of cheer girls and cheer leaders, this profession has a very limited shelf life and the participants have to be agile, possess stamina necessary for long stints on the stage and not get unduly perturbed about inadvertent display of their charms. This has led to the downfall of at least one promising and talented sports person – a teenage tennis sensation who had always to be careful of not revealing extra cleavage.

While cheer girls were introduced in the IPL only now, its history is not new. In the Bishop Cotton Girls’ school of Bangalore, they have been in existence for many years. It is a part of the school’s education programme. While on the subject, it was interesting to learn that many celebrities had at one time in their illustrious lives been in this profession – they include Madonna, Meryl Streep, Halle Berry, Tina Turner, Cameron Diaz and in the men’s section there were past American Presidents like Ronald Reagan, Franklin D Roosevelt, George W Bush apart from actors like Tom Hanks. Cheer leaders serve the cause of promoting any sport and are incentives to attract not only the crowds but also sponsors.