Are Indians of the present generation more Korean than Koreans? Let’s see!: The year was 2012, the month was July. Something happened which transformed the world. ‘Gangnam Style’ got released. It was the 6th music album of Korean pop singer PSY, who was locally known and globally unknown. The world that hardly knew much about Korea or its culture until then, seemed to grow intelligent all of a sudden. All hell broke loose in the global culture sphere. ‘Bright green’ became the favourite colour of the generation. Appearing ‘funky’ and dancing while walking on the streets started defining new trend of the time. In 3 months, the song breached 1 billion views on YouTube, and became the first Korean song to achieve this feat.
In India, the impact was profound. Everyone who could jump, jumped around with the horse styled strides and sang the first line of the song, ‘Oppa Gangnam Style’. Majorly because this was the only line they could decipher or keep in mind. The rest of the song was incomprehensible. India, that proudly claimed itself to fight against the onset of western culture in their traditional roots, happily and dancingly succumbed to the neighbourhood Korean culture. And the K-pop culture set foot in India this way.
With the passage of time, the song faded in attraction, as is destined with any specific source of entertainment. But remarkable was its sustenance in the form of 240 days of commercial trading that remained strong on the best song lists throughout the country. Gangnam Style kept leaping in and out of the top 3 positions for close to 8 months, in a country that is always restraining anything ‘foreign’ and is supposedly rigid in its selections. And then there was a long gap with a subdued fan-base, largely silent and content with their choices of K-bands. Until the pandemic struck.
Among the many changes that the pandemic of 2019-2020 triggered, the one most notable to Indian lives was the rise of Korean culture or K-culture. Academicians called it “Hallyu”, and millennials called it “Korean Wave”. The YouTube streaming of Korean pop songs amazed the world once again, but this time Indian youth was the focus of analysis. Increase in streaming rates of Korean songs from India which attributed to 11% of all streaming before pandemic, reached 95% in 2020, and 256% in 2022. Korean music bands achieved new cult status as “BTS” and “BlackPink” became the household names. In the music world, embracing foreign cultures to such an extent is usually rare, and was perhaps witnessed themost with “Michael Jackson” and “Beatles” at least half a century ago. The pandemic also redefined the soap-opera inclinations of Indian youth. Until the end of 2019, Indian soap operas claimed the local mass-audiences while American soaps attracted niche segments. The pandemic changed this preferential attitude. K-dramas penetrated with complete preparation; it resembled the prep of a class topper who has taken an oath to outperform himself in every test, through sheer grasp on content that can be applied in all scenarios. In the middle of the ocean of pandemic-led anxiety, Korean dramas brought the relief by blending the aesthetically attractive pictures from various cultures around the world, mixing old and new, traditional and modern, and which instantly appealed to Indian youth.
But behind this preparation was a strong foundation. The cultural foundation, that has helped Korea progress rapidly on the world stage, much beyond the confines of entertainment. We are talking about a culture that has been proactively assertive in catching up with the global markets. And in doing so it stays so agile that the figments of foreign cultures easily blend into its own, while remaining immune to any foundational misalignment. Samsung did the same a century ago. Hyundai and LG followed the course. And now we have K-Beauty and K-Fashion witnessing evolution and marking the revolution.
How does it relate to Indians?
It is the cultural proximity that connects India with South Korea. Imbibed in both the cultures is their arts of storytelling. Centuries ago in India, stories drove and inspired generations through multiple channels- grant parents, parents, neighbourhood chaupals, gossips, books. Then the time changed, parents outgrew their roles and channels got confined to TVs and radios, with occasional books. Then the reforms happened in social spheres, and commercial storytelling sessions took over. In this process, the culture redefined itself every time it encountered a change, minor or major. And in this ever changing and vulnerable culture that hinged on stories for generational inspiration, Korean culture penetrated with its amazingly preserved art of storytelling. Indians could immediately resonate with their roots bearing the similar pulse.
The rise in Korean dramas and the rapidity with which Korean programmes are being dubbed on OTT channels reinforce this theory of cultural connection between India and Korea. The majority of K-dramas projecting similar themes of finding love, heart-break, then finding love again exhibit the ‘desi love stories’ of 60s and 70s. Those love stories that were all same and yet all of them super-hit with masses. Accompanied with foods in between so frequently that they appeared to be the stories in between food series. K-dramas are doing the same, and the K-cuisine industry is happy about that.
No, is OTT to be blamed?
This long 1000-word article will lose it’s objective if it cannot declare “OTT not guilty” for cultural shift in India. It’s not OTT, it’s the gaps and cracks formed in our own culture over the time that permitted Korean culture to seep in so easily. And the cultural proximity, the similarity between the entertainment preferences of Indians and Koreans, expedited the process. What the Indian youth was missing by way of lost storytelling through generations, was filled in the void perfectly with the traditional narration by Korean storytellers and K-drama makers. What did OTT do? It just served as the tool to fill void; though so equipped with technology that the filling resembled a supersonic jet passing over you before you realized that the Culture turned to Kulture.
