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Why is settling down linked to getting married, asks Ekta Kapoor
New Delhi, April 5 (IANS) Successful producer Ekta Kapoor wonders why Indian society links being settled down to marriage.
Ekta, who has produced content for television, films and now has a presence on the digital medium too, received the FLO (FICCI Ladies Organisation) Icon Award for Media Entrepreneurship here on Thursday.
President Ram Nath Kovind was the guest of honour at the event at Vigyan Bhawan, where Kapoor was among 10 women achievers lauded at the 34th annual FICCI Women’s Group FLO Awards.
During an interactive session at the event, Kapoor said she failed to understand why she has to be married to settle down and why the two things linked at all.
“What I am asked a lot by journalists is, ‘When are you settling down?’ How much more do I need to settle down? I really don’t understand why settling down is linked to getting married. For years, my father and mother saved the best of alcohol for my marriage.
“This year, the defining moment of my life came when my father took all of that out on his 75th birthday. It was a celebration of today and not expectations of tomorrow,” said Ekta, daughter of veteran actor Jeetendra.
Often called the “queen of soap operas” on the Indian small screen, Ekta also faced criticism for showing “regressive storylines” in shows like “Kyunki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi”, “Kahaani Ghar Ghar Ki”, “Kahin Kissi Roz”, “Kasautii Zindagii Kay” and “Pavitra Rishta”.
On the flip side, she has produced movies like “Lipstick Under My Burkha”, and now she is connecting with the youth through a digital app ALTBalaji where some of the series explore homosexuality and other taboo topics.
She said: “My journey has been quite a paradox. I make movies which explore sexuality and TV shows which have very conservative families. And I think both are two sides of the same coin. I deal with everything with a pinch of salt. I am quite a feminist,” she said.
“Just because the woman is in a sari doesn’t mean that she cannot shoot a gun. That is what I feel happens a lot in TV. I get a lot of women who expect me to conform because I do a lot of socially conservative TV, and they get bit of a shock like when they ask me, ‘Girls today think about sex a lot’ and I say, ‘They do it as well’.”
Ekta, however, said she has evolved.
“I started doing family shows when I was 24 and films like ‘Lipstick Under My Burkha’ at 42. At a younger age, I have done more conservative stuff but as I aged, I did more of what I can call non-conformist work. I think we should not put ourselves into a box. We all need to realise that,” she said.
–IANS
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International online casino Casino Days has published a report sharing their internal data on what types and brands of devices are used to play on the platform by users from the South Asian region.
Such aggregate data analyses allow the operator to optimise their website for the brands and models of devices people are actually using.
The insights gained through the research also help Casino Days tailor their services based on the better understanding of their clients and their needs.
Desktops and Tablets Lose the Battle vs Mobile
The primary data samples analysed by Casino Days reveal that mobile connections dominate the market in South Asia and are responsible for a whopping 96.6% of gaming sessions, while computers and tablets have negligible shares of 2.9% and 0.5% respectively.
The authors of the study point out that historically, playing online casino was exclusively done on computers, and attribute thе major shift to mobile that has unfolded over time to the wide spread of cheaper smartphones and mobile data plans in South Asia.
“Some of the reasons behind this massive difference in device type are affordability, technical advantages, as well as cheaper and more obtainable internet plans for mobiles than those for computers,” the researchers comment.
Xiaomi and Vivo Outperform Samsung, Apple Way Down in Rankings
Chinese brands Xiaomi and Vivo were used by 21.9% and 20.79% of Casino Days players from South Asia respectively, and together with the positioned in third place with a 18.1% share South Korean brand Samsung dominate the market among real money gamers in the region.
Cupertino, California-based Apple is way down in seventh with a user share of just 2.29%, overshadowed by Chinese brands Realme (11.43%), OPPO (11.23%), and OnePlus (4.07%).
Huawei is at the very bottom of the chart with a tiny share just below the single percent mark, trailing behind mobile devices by Motorola, Google, and Infinix.
The data on actual phone usage provided by Casino Days, even though limited to the gaming parts of the population of South Asia, paints a different picture from global statistics on smartphone shipments by vendors.
Apple and Samsung have been sharing the worldwide lead for over a decade, while current regional leader Xiaomi secured their third position globally just a couple of years ago.
Striking Android Dominance among South Asian Real Money Gaming Communities
The shifted market share patterns of the world’s top smartphone brands in South Asia observed by the Casino Days research paper reveal a striking dominance of Android devices at the expense of iOS-powered phones.
On the global level, Android enjoys a comfortable lead with a sizable 68.79% share which grows to nearly 79% when we look at the whole continent of Asia. The data on South Asian real money gaming communities suggests that Android’s dominance grows even higher and is north of the 90% mark.
Among the major factors behind these figures, the authors of the study point to the relative affordability of and greater availability of Android devices in the region, especially when manufactured locally in countries like India and Vietnam.
“And, with influencers and tech reviews putting emphasis on Android devices, the choice of mobile phone brand and OS becomes easy; Android has a much wider range of products and caters to the Asian online casino market in ways that Apple can’t due to technical limitations,” the researchers add.
The far better integration achieved by Google Pay compared to its counterpart Apple Pay has also played a crucial role in shaping the existing smartphone market trends.
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