Scrolling through Instagram is a good concoction of pleasure and pain. As a one year old veteran, I have learnt the patterns people adopt to seek much required validation. For those posting regularly, this validation is of utmost importance, without which, even they would admit, life will be as hollow as India’s oxygen cylinders. Keeping the pretentiousness posed to maintain relevancy aside, this does have an upside for them. The likes, the hearts, and thumbs up received on their posts keep their therapy bills low and the economy of the telecom market pretty upbeat.

The patterns of these posts are not difficult to trace. One of these is what I’d like to call ‘the candidly posed uncandid elegance’. The recipe is simple:

• Wear a traditional attire – a colourful Kurta with a Chunni light enough to fly at the flick of your wrist. Salwar or Chudidar will also do the magic.
• Go to a place which has one or both of these – a plant with a good balance of flowers and leaves (Bougainville is recommended) and a building in the background which reminds you of powerless good-for-nothing British stooges of the 19th century such as the ‘high-class’ aristocrats of Lucknow or the traditional Wadiyars of Mysore.
• Stand where the light is feeble. If you, however, cannot manage this, any good Instagram filter which mellows the colours will do. Alternatively, if you have pretty strong light – such as the Sun – you may consider giving it some pixels through your translucent Chunni.
• Keep your hair open. Let them fly or make them settle to give an image of disorderly order – casual, yet naturally symmetric.
• Place your hand with slightly folded fingers at the temple or over the ear. Smile the way Anarkali did when Saleem had his testosterone pumped up the first time he saw her. If not, you may pout with a serious look – a look one makes when they find out Santa Claus is fake.
• To add some diversity, you may instead use your hands to hold something. A coffee cup is pretty standard in this template.
• You must not look at the camera. Unlike the camera lenses, your eye lenses are animate over which the rules of Hijaab apply. So, dare not look at the camera! The appropriate go-to is to stare at the top towards the sky as if you are contemplating a critic to Jürgen Habermas’ communicative rationality. However, this is undesirable if you have some body fat hanging down the chin, for these double-chinned curves are not as enticing as curves elsewhere. In this case, you should stare towards the ground as if you’re noticing gravity for the first time and trying to figure out its source.
• The placement of your leg is important. Standing straight is a mark of weakness, and does not challenge Cerebellum enough. You must then place either of your legs in front and support it only on the toes. It helps you look both thin and tall – objective standards of beauty necessary for more likes. The preferable inclination of this leg is about 20-25 degrees from normal. Ensure that you stay within this window and not be too liberal, lest you do the split and tear several things.
• Finally, you need an elegant caption. Something that’s been ripped off from the internet is often better and does the job without dropping sweat. As Rumi once said, “let veracity not impede your efforts in quoting me on social media.” Profound words and, at least, twenty more likes right there! To add some pizzazz, an Urdu couplet goes pretty well and also gives the illusion that you are literate in Urdu – a language universally used to build the façade of elegance. And no, it does not matter if you cannot read or write a sentence in Urdu to save your life.

The ingredients are now complete. Post the picture and make sure you check the number of likes every two-and-half minutes. Once you touch the baseline of triple digits, you can rest well. Your mission to seek validation, burn the day, and affirm your relevance is complete. You may now scroll the feed with much confidence and judge every other person, while at the same time, giving them a like to keep up their stream of validation. This mutual appreciation cycle shall keep us healthy and sane.