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We really need to look at issue-based programmes with more compassionate eyes. Star one's Siddhanth gets the idiom right. This week's story featured Manini De as a working woman fighting gender bias at work and her husband's sneering contempt at home. Good story, told with a certain flair. The lead actor playing the wry lawyer is very effective. He just needs to work on his diction in the English language. As the nation gears up for the Big Bang on Star Plus on Friday (KBC 2, of course) the other channels seem to be resorting to what looks like desperate measures to woo viewers away.

Would you want to miss the first episode of KBC just to attend Jassi's shaadi? Ummmm… Let me put this another way. The promos of KBC 2 where the inimitable Mr Bachchan gives us miniature rags-to-riches stories illustrating the duguna (double) virtues of the new KBC, are enough to keep us glued to the screen.

The opening episode of KBC 2 would be the most avidly watched television happening in recent years. No doubt about that! It will also go on to become the success story of the season, usurping the flash-popularity of the multitude of talent-scouting contests that have hit the other channels, particularly Sony.

I continue to watch Fame Gurukul sporadically. But I'm losing patience with its ongoing efforts to do reality TV. What I like are the truly informed judges, particularly Javed Akhtar who's a delicious mixture of concern and causticity.

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On Wednesday I could see him making a valiant effort to be ruthless with the contestant. "How do you expect to emerge a winner when you say you are the fifth best among your colleagues?" Javed Akhtar made a male contestant squirm. But Qazi (that was the contestant's name) handled the aggression well.

We all learn to swim in the tides. That's what Mumbai taught us last week. The coverage of the flash floods in the city was more panicky than professional. A female correspondent on Star News went on an aerial yatra of deluged Mumbai. Her shrill voice pierced the humid air with what seemed like a poor imitation of a cricket commentary.

Have a heart! Shouldn't there be a difference between a cricket match and a natural disaster? The correspondents use the same urgent tone to communicate both events in equally animated tones.

I quite like some of the humour on Star One's The Great Indian Comedy Show. Shekhar Suman's entry has done the humour a wealth of good. Having enjoyed the Sarkar spoof I was looking forward to seeing more. This week's takeoff on Dawood's daughter's wedding attendance from Bollywood was an ode to the Burqa, and one that I didn't enjoy much.

But I fell off my chair watching the spoof on Aamir Khan's moustachiod bravado in The Rising. The guy doing an Aamir Khan had got the actor's speech patterns completely in place. The following night Mahesh Bhatt came on the show to make fun of moustaches and The Rising moustache, in particular.

For those who came in late there's a history to Mahesh's soured relationship with Aamir Khan. And it showed that evening.

Mr Bhatt's seemingly profound diatribe about why men sport moutaches as a verification of their manhood, was hilarious. Wish we could say the same about the level of humour in the average time-passer which just goes from bad to worse. The worst offender are the celeb chat shows which can get really funny (albeit unintentionally). Why, for instance, was Jimmy Shergil wearing dark glasses in the dark studio while speaking to the correspondent on India TV's Chat Masala?

Why was British actor Toby Smith telling the correspondent on CNBC that working in movies in Britain is so much easier. And that he has decided not to play James Bond because "Once you're Bbond, you're Bond". Technically not true. Sean Connery was Bond. But he also did other things, and quite well.

I caught a wonderful documentary last Saturady on DD News about a girl born of cross-parentage and how she coped with the 'Muslimness' in her personality as opposed to her Hindu side. What was remarkable about this sensitive documentary was that it was chatty and intimate rather than polemical and distancing. As she took us to the places and feelings that she experiences everyday the film made us feel close to the protagonist and her predicament.

We don't get that feeling too often on TV... unless it's Ravi Rai's Kasshish on Zee TV where we feel totally clued in to the wife's (Simone Singh) miscarriage.

Otherwise sensitivity isn't a big virtue on Indian television.

(The views expressed here are those of the author and indiantelevision.com need not necessarily subscribe to the same)