Bigg Boss 5 was the fifth season of the Indian reality TV show Bigg Boss, which aired on Colors from 2 October 2011 to 7 January 2012 with Salman Khan and Sanjay Dutt as the hosts.
During the launch on 2 October, fourteen hand-picked housemates entered the house located in Karjat, a town, about halfway between Mumbai and Pune in the Indian state of Maharashtra. Four additional wild card entries were made during the second, third, fourth and the end of seventh week taking the number of contestants to eighteen. Three guest entries, who stayed in the house for a couple of days, took the total number of inhabitants to twenty one. The housemates, considered strangers for each other, spent 98 days (14 weeks) locked out together under the supervision of 55 cameras fitted around the house.
The series was won by soap actress and television presenter Juhi Parmar on 7 January 2012. Runner-Up, Mahek Chahal returned to compete in Bigg Boss Halla Bol. She became the second housemate to get evicted on Day 17.
The opening episode was aired on 2 October 2011 presented by Salman Khan and Sanjay Dutt. This extravagant introductory episode to the season 5 showcased different features of the Bigg Boss house and introduced each of the participant. It also featured Bollywood actors Ajay Devgn for the promo of their upcoming film Rascals and Samir Soni for promoting his new serial Parichay on Colors.
Shakti Kapoor, Veteran Bollywood actor
Pooja Bedi, Television personality and newspaper columnist
Shonali Nagrani, Actress and model
Nihita Biswas, Charles Sobhraj's wife
Shraddha Sharma, TV actress and Raja Choudhary's ex girlfriend
Mandeep Bevli, News anchor
Raageshwari, Singer
Vida Samadzai, Former Miss Afghanistan
Mahek Chahal, Bollywood actress
Sonika Kaliraman, Wrestler
Pooja Misrra, Reality TV alumni
Gulabo Sapera, Dancer
Laxmi Narayan Tripathi, LGBT rights activist
Juhi Parmar, Indian television actress
Wild card entrants
Amar Upadhyay, Indian television actor
Siddharth Bhardwaj, Reality TV alumni
Akashdeep Saigal, Indian television actor
Sunny Leone, Actress and former porn star
Guest entrants
Agnivesh
Andrew Symonds
Yamamotoyama Ryūta
Ranbir Kapoor
Mahesh Bhatt
Ranveer Singh
John Abraham
Akshay Kumar
Automatic nomination (due to violation(s) committed, failure of task or direct nomination by House Captain)
Granted immunity (due to being chosen by an evictee while exiting, by housemates or House Captain)
Fake nomination.
Red numbers indicate nominations from Evictees
Green numbers indicate nominations from House Captains
Pink numbers indicate nominations from Housemates to save from Eviction
Blue numbers indicate nominations from Housemates' Family/Friends who visited the house to meet their loved ones.
^5 Shonali was safe for another week as captain, Housemates were unable to cast their nominations against her. Shonali nominated Pooja M. directly placing her against public vote. Remaining housemates nominated Mahek, Mandeep and Amar
^6 Shraddha was safe as captain and Siddharth was immune from nominations because Mandeep took his name when Bigg Boss asked her to save one housemate from eviction on Week 6 while she was leaving the house. Housemates were unable to cast their nominations against them. Shraddha nominated Akashdeep directly placing him against public vote. Remaining housemates nominated Pooja M., Mahek and Laxmi.
^7 Akashdeep was safe as captain and Mahek was immune from nominations because Laxmi took her name when Bigg Boss asked her to save one housemate from eviction on Week 7 while she was leaving the house. Hence,they were immune from Nomination. Akashdeep, taking assistance from Siddharth nominated Shraddha, Pooja M., Vida and Shonali directly placing them against public vote.
^8 Amar was safe as captain and nominated Pooja B. directly placing her against public vote. Akashdeep was nominated for eviction by the Bigg Boss as a result of losing the weekly task. Sunny was exempt from nomination. Remaining housemates nominated Mahek and Siddharth.
^9 Mahek was made the captain after Pooja M. (the reigning captain was ejected) and,hence, was safe for nominations. She nominated Akashdeep directly placing him against public vote. Akashdeep, Siddharth and Amar were called in the confession room to decide two names to directly place against the public vote. The trio came up with Shraddha and Sunny.
^10 Instead of nominating two housemates to place against the public vote, Bigg Boss asked the housemates to give two names whom they would save from eviction. Housemates saved Akashdeep and Sunny. Contrary to the result, the remaining housemates were put up for eviction.
^11 Before leaving the Family/Friends of the housemates, who came for a short visit to meet their loved ones, were asked to nominate two names for eviction excluding Pooja M., Siddharth and Andrew. Hence, Amar and Shonali got nominated.
^12 Captain's post was abolished by the Bigg Boss as punishment. Housemates nominated Amar, Siddharth, Juhi and Sunny. Voting lines were closed for the week, however, housemates were unaware of this. Mahek returned to the house via "Wildcard Voting Contest".
^13 Housemates weren't asked to give names to nominate for eviction. Bigg Boss nominated all housemates to give each an equal chance to secure their position in the final week.
^14 During the final week the public voted for who they wanted to win.
Ratings, Reception and Viewership
According to data available with aMap, a television viewership monitoring agency, the opening episode of Bigg Boss 5 got a rating of 4.3. Season 4 had an average rating of 3.6. Season 3 had average rating of 2.43 while Bigg Boss 2 and Bigg Boss 1 had average ratings of 2.03 and 1.96.
After Pooja Misrra's unexpected exit, Bigg Boss 5 started to lose its viewership in less than a week. In India, many fans who were supporters of the newly renowned Pooja M., who was bullied throughout the show, stopped watching since she was shown the doors. Many others stopped watching because of Sky and Siddharth's indecent display of manners towards the female inhabitants and also due to the continuous favoritism by Bigg Boss who had always showed a lenient attitude towards the male contestants. As a result, Bigg Boss 5 got a marked decline in its TRP ratings which fell drastically after the Aapka Farmaan episode aired on 26 November 2011. According to some TRP sites, BB5 had reached 0.69 at one point. The Undekha Act was not in top 100.
