Hindi TV Serial - Diya Aur Bati Hum - Suraj and Sandhya leave the home, Bhabho riding on her ego

The first sign of a split in the household, but the makers of the serial are also trying to convey that this is not the intent of the serial. After all, for the past few episodes, they have shown 2 conflicting points - Suraj badly wants to ensure that Sandhya lives upto the ambition of her parents and herself and becomes an IPS officer. Sandhya also wants that, but is hesitant to go with full effort towards this goal. Due to her realization of the time that Bhabho tried to give her liqour chocolates so that she would miss the exam, she realized that Bhabho desperately wants to ensure that Sandhya remains the bahu of the house, and not give into the quest to become an IPS office. She is reluctant to break this hope of Bhabho, but at the same time, Suraj has invested a lot of his emotions in ensuring that she lives upto her dreams, and hence is caught in this conflict. Bhabasa learns all this when he questions her about her not trying her best in the final round of the show, and finally tells her that she must live upto the dreams of everybody and Suraj will handle Bhabho. Well, she does win the show and comes home to a time of a lot of tension.
As usual, when she comes home, Meena has done a lot to stir the pot. She got some of the neighbors to come to the house for the welcoming of Sandhya after winning the contest, and also tried to provoke Bhabho by referring to the third pot which will now not be broken. At this, Bhabhasa tells her to take the pot to her room and ensure that it does not break. However, Bhabho is in a highly angry mood and even refuses the sweet that has been prepared by Chaturi in celebration of the win; and this win means that there is no further effort from Bhabho's side to prepare for the contest.
Bhabho later taunts Suraj for solely trying to fulfil the wishes of his wife, but he tells her that this is unfair. When he did for others, he was a good brother, a good son, but when he tries to do for his wife, he is now suddenly become a slave to his wife. However, he tells Bhabho that since things are bad between them now, he will leave the house. Everybody in the house is shocked and try to stop him, but Bhabho is so angry right now that she says that if they want to leave, they should leave. He tells Bhabho that he believes that she will come to take him in 15 days only (and with the kind of other children that she has, it will be in less than 15 days that she would realize his true worth), but Bhabho tells him that she will not come to take him in. When Sandhya objects, he tells her that this is not because of her and she has to leave the house as well.
Things are otherwise difficult in the house. Emily and Mohit are tense because Mohit is short of money and was hoping that Emily might win something, after all, Bhabho could come to him anytime for the money; and even otherwise Meena should be totally distraught since that means most of the money needed for running the house should now come from Vikram, and Meena would be horrified at that. Bhabho already knows the kind of lies that her own daughter Chavi can say, since she had tested this out and determined this.

Hindi TV Serial - Diya Aur Bati Hum - Sandhya exposes bribery, hunting for the culprit

This is the last chance for Sandhya. She has already gone through 2 chances that Bhabho gave her, and 2 of her matkas where broken thus giving her only one chance for reaching her ambition of joining the IPS and becoming a police officer. This last chance is if she wins a contest called SBC (Sabse Bada Champion). To the surprise of everyone in the family, Emily also wanted to take part in the show since this would give a chance for her to win some money (and this would replace the money that Mohit lost in the chit fund). There was some apprehension about whether she would be able to attend, but in the end, Bhabho allowed her to attend the contest as well, and to some extent, Bhabho would rather Emily won the show, since she does not want Sandhya to win the show and go for a career in the IPS.
The show has now started, and there was some surprise about the fact that 2 members of the same family entered the show. The show took the entrants through some round of questions, and there would be people eliminated in the various rounds. In the first round, Sandhya did great and topped. On the other hand, Emily barely scraped through. However, in the next round, where the contestants had to convince a large number of people in a movie hall to go with them, Emily won the round. Now things were getting tense. It was this time that Mohit wanted to make sure that Emily won, and he found that his old friend, Manoj is a part of the show, and he manages to get Manoj to come and give him answers for the forthcoming round.
In the next round, Sandhya and Emily are in one round where they have to select an article, and there they have to show between a rope and a tissue roll. Emily has been told that the roll is the correct item, but Sandhya insists on the rope, and it turns out that the rope was indeed the answer, Manoj had mistook rope for roll.
However, soon after Sandhya smells something wrong, while in the meantime Manoj is trying to get the laptop of Abhimanyu, so that he can find the answer. He finally manages to get hold of the laptop, but in the meantime Sandhya is suspicious of Manoj and follows him, and then she manages to get hold of his phone and shows it to everyone, thus showing that he had been helping somebody. Everybody is shocked that Manoj was trying to subvert the show, and they decide to hold off the contest proceedings till they find the name of the participant who was getting help from Manoj. And they all praise Sandhya for her attempts in this regard.
On the other side, Meena is starting to have motherly feelings towards Mishri, who is actually her daughter, and tried to get close to her, but Daisa stops her from doing son. And then the precap for an upcoming episode shows that Meena and Chavvi will have a argument where Meena will reveal many things that Chavvi did, and Bhabho hears all those.

Hindi TV Serial - Diya Aur Bati Hum - Chhavi blames Sandhya for her problems in the exam hall

For Chavvi, the exams are a top priority right now, and all because till now she had not been paying any attention to her studies. However, the last time she met her fiancee Dileep, her future mother-in-law made it clear that they were looking for a daughter-in-law who was well educated, and for that, it was important for her to clear her exams. However, till now, she had not given any priority to her exams. Now it was a challenge. She tried to figure out a way to cheat but was puzzled in the actual paper when it turned out that the questions were different from what she was expecting. She finally saw a solution when Sandhya's papers dropped on the floor and she was able to pick it up and write the answers from there. However, she was caught and even though she denied at that time that Sandhya had given her the papers, she had to think of a solution for home. After all, she was denied from giving the papers and her answer sheet was seized.
So she came home and made up the story that Sandhya was trying to help her and her answer sheet was found with Chavvi and hence it was because of Sandhya that she was prevented from giving the exams. Sandhya totally denied this and said that she did not do anything and it was totally Chavvi's fault. However, Meena did her bit to provoke Bhabho, getting the matka for Bhabho to break and claiming that this will break Chavvi's marriage and so on. Bhabho gave Chavvi another chance by telling her that she lied many times in the past and does she want to change her story, but Chavvi refused to changer her story and claimed that it was Sandhya at fault.
As a result, with the 3 matkas that Bhabho had kept for breaking as a result of mistakes of Sandhya, she broke the first one and gave a date of Sandhya's birthday for the remaining 2 matkas. Sandhya is very disappointed and angry over what has happened and Suraj tries his best to ensure that he calms her down and tells her to expose the truth. She decides to do that, although it is not clear right now as to what she will do. The people in the exam hall know the truth, so maybe that is one avenue.
At the sweets shop, Suraj has a big order and has kept it all in the shop, but Emily, Chavvi and Meena all go to the shop for different reasons and will leave the shop open, causing rats to come in and spoil some of what Suraj has prepared.

Hindi TV Serial - Diya Aur Bati Hum - Bhabho has a strong attack of conscience

The serial is showing a side of Bhabho that was not ever shown before. Bhabho has always been determined that Sandhya would never be a police officer and she would do whatever was necessary to prevent that. As a consequence, she decided to feed liquor chocolates to Sandhya during the marriage ceremonies, on the eve of the test, so that Sandhya would not be in a proper state of mind to give the test.
In the meantime, the marriage ceremonies were getting over with Emily coming to the home and doing some more ceremonies in the house. Finally, during some teasing, Emily and Mohit are in the room, and it is there that Emily gets a big shock. Mohit takes off his pagri, and then scolds Emily that she finally got what she wanted. Emily is shocked at this tone from Mohit and tells him that this was what was best for both of them, and both of them did love each other. However, Mohit told her that he was shocked when she went to the police station against him, and she had lost his love forever as a result of that. Emily told him that they had a child coming to birth, and so on ... but as of now Mohit is determined, since he tells her that she may have got married to him, but there is no love between them, and he will not give her the love a husband would give to a wife, and nothing she does will change that.
On the other side, both Chavvi and Sandhya have started studying for the exam for the next day, but Sandhya is not very stable, primarily because of the liquor that she ate (which was forced on her by Bhabho, given that Bhabho knew that the effect of those liquor chocolates would ensure that she was dizzy the next day, hardly the best of state to be in when you are giving an exam). Suraj tries to help her, but soon after, Sandhya is falling dizzy and goes to sleep. At the other side, Vikram is being sarcastic against Meena, since he tells her that you are the only one who is differentiating between a girl child and a male child, I would have treated both of them the same.
The next morning, Bhabho has a strong attack of conscience, with her conscience facing back to her in the mirror and telling her that she has sunk low, since she did not use good tactics to get her method, the use of liquor to force Sandhya against going for the test was not right. This conscience finally forced Bhabho at attempt to wake up Sandhya, and when Meena was surprised about this, she also got an earful from Bhabho on this one. Finally, Bhabho managed to wake up Sandhya, who was also in a bad state, and they are in the nick of time, managed to take Sandhya to the exam center, but the iron grill has just been closed by a guard.

Hindi TV Serial - Diya Aur Bati Hum - Marriage rituals for Mohit and Emily

The marriage of Mohit and Emily was finally on. After a lot of struggle for acceptance of this marriage, finally everybody had accepted. Due to the struggle in the village (which would have refused to accept a marriage between different castes), Sandhya finally managed to get everybody to agree to the wedding even though there was a lot of drama, and even their life was threatened. Eventually, Maasa was convinced and over-rode any objections Bhabho may have had about this, telling Sandhya that she was to be the one responsible for ensuring that the marriage would happen, and to organize the marriage events.
On the other hand, Meena gave birth to a child, which was a girl, but she managed to swap places with the child born in Daisa's house, which was a boy. This swap happened in a hospital where there was a lot of confusion going on since there were a number of deliveries happening at the same time and the hospital was under-staffed. Ever since then, Meena had been under a lot of pressure, since she feared that her truth would get exposed one time or the other. Even the fact that the child had a much darker complexion that her or her husband was an item of concern for her since others had already pointed this out - however Bhabhasa had managed this by pointing out that his complexion was darker, and hence it could be that the child had got the dark complexion from him.
Now, when people from 2 different regions or castes get married, there is often confusion about the marriage functions, since there could be difference in the customs of the marriage festivities. And when the marriage is between people of different religions, there would be a lot more differences, including the fact that a function would also need to happen in church. Bhabho was in her heart not very happy about this, and Meena was doing her best to stoke the fears of Bhabho in this respect by pointing out that eventually Sandhya would become all powerful, and would actually become a police officer. As a result, Bhabho repeated her internal vow that she would not let Sandhya join the police, and become an officer.
There were a lot of compromises that were happening in the marriage festivities, and the 2 different sets of festivities were very different from each other, but if something failed, then it would be repeated and eventually the festivities were proceeding. A problem for Meena was that one of the nurses from the hospital was also there, and her fear about getting exposed was there; and then she would also see her husband getting friendly with the nurse, which also brought about her jealousy.
Bhabho on the other hand had heard about some liquour chocolates that were there as part of the festivities, and she managed to feed some of them to Sandhya, and Sandhya was starting to feel dizzy because of these.

Hindi TV Serial - Diya Aur Bati Hum - After the feat of Kajri, people agree to Emily and Mohit wedding

As usual, the serial takes another serious problem and then resolves it in a manner that seems to show that the tradition should be broken if it is against humanity. However, in the serial they show a major tragedy about to happen which changes the mood and minds of the villagers, and this causes them to break their tradition. However, for those cases where such a feeling does exist, one cannot always depend on some kind of tragedy and heroic action to change the minds of the local people, especially when it came to caste and religious differences.
The serial has them at Maasa's village where they have also taken Emily and Mohit to get Emily to take part in the festivities of the marriage in Maasa's family and also see whether Maasa can give approval for Mohit and Emily to get married. However, they also realise that in the village, there are lots of problems with regard to inter-caste and inter-religion marriage. Given that Bhabho was initially against the marriage with Emily because she was Christian, Maasa would be more firmly against such a marriage. However, finally Emily meets her approval after she touches up her face (after some treatment left Maasa's face with marks).
But Maasa does not know that Emily is a Christian, and it is even more dangerous when the rest of the village gets to know about this fact. When the village thakur gets to know about this, he is very angry, calls this a violation of the traditions of the village and wants to hunt down Mohit and Emily so that they can be punished with death.
Suraj escapes with them while the rest of the Rathi family are locked up. Suraj, Mohit and Emily hide in an old haveli, while Sandhya does some drama inside the place where they are locked up to ensure that the guards open the place. However, by this time the hunt is over and Suraj, Mohit and Emily are found. Things are getting problematic for them, with imminent danger, and they find that a fire has happened which has caused many young children of the village to get stuck, along with Chotu. The fire spreads such that there is no way for the children to get out and anybody to get to them.
And then Sandhya remembers that there is a way to get to them, through walking on a rope that can be stretched to the haveli, but the only person who can do that is Kajri, who is near crazy because her son and daughter-in-law were killed because they broke a similar tradition of the village. Kajri is reluctant to do this, but is persuaded to do this. She makes several trips, walking on the rope and getting back the children one by one, including the son of the thakur.
Once this happens, Sandhya lamblasts the villagers about their beliefs, saying that their children was saved by one whose close ones were killed horribly by the villagers and now they are trying to thank her for saving their children. Finally, the thakur and the villagers agree for the marriage and so does Maasa. Bhabho is somewhat reluctant, but then is scolded by Maasa, who asks for the wedding of Mohit and Emily to be planned soon, and asks Sandhya to take the responsibility for doing the marriage. 

Hindi TV Serial - Diya Aur Bati Hum - More twists in the serial with Mohit and Emily

The serial is planning to take its viewers through more twists and turns; now, even though they do show most of the conservative elements of Indian society in some way, the serial does show changes brought forward in this society due to education, and due to sheer persistence. The serial has been criticized in some aspects because of the sheer conservatism of the family and the reluctance of the educated daughter-in-law of the family to significantly object to some of these customs - instead she does oppose them but not in a direct way; instead the show shows her trying to use slow processes, but based on logic and reasoning to make these changes, backed solidly by her husband (one wonders how this would have turned out if the husband, Suraj, had not been supportive of these changes but had instead been as conservative as anybody else).
After the expose of the Swami, Sandhya gains more respect due to the logic and reasoning she used to expose the Swami and his plans of usurping land by building a mall in the region. The expose of the miracles done by the Swami meant that people understood how those miracles were happening and also ensured that the trouble that her family was going through finally disappeared, and that her family was able to hold up its head in society again (there was a time when the efforts by the Swami meant that her family was being exposed to actual physical harm).
Now, one of the byproducts of the effort done by Sandhya was that Bhabho ensured that she would be able to go to college in the day instead of in the evening / night (the family was surprised when a letter announcing her admission in the college came, and even more when it was revealed that it was Bhabho who had caused this to happen). Meenakshi was very surprised since this meant that there was more affection between Bhabho and Sandhya, and the possibility of Bhabho getting angry and kicking Sandhya out of the house had reduced for now (till the time that the serial wants more masala in the serial).
The next major problem in the serial will come to challenge Bhabho's belief in no cross-caste or cross-religion marriage, since she will find that her own son is involved in a relationship with a Christian girl, a shocker for sure. Meenakshi will discover that Mohit is in a relation with Emily, and her nosy nature will lead her to learn that Emily is actually pregnant with Mohit's child, which will be a shocker for Bhabho in more than one way. What will Bhabho do now ? Or will Mohit actually get married to Emily and then present Bhabho with a decision already taken.

Hindi TV Serial - Diya Aur Bati Hum - Sandhya reveals the truth behind the Swami

The serial keeps on showing the evolution in the life of an educated girl with values who is living in a more conservative household in a conservative society. The pressures in her life, the struggle to try and increase the level of education, to become more progressive is shown in the serial. Sometimes the serial seems to descend to a level where the girl is shown as being down-trodden most of the times, but the character is shown as trying her best to do what she thinks is best, to improve her conditions, and to also ensure that people think in a logical and right way. One of the best examples is when the household of the lady is put under pressure by a religious swami, who accuses the family of stealing the jewels of the goddess and claims that the family will suffer for what they have done, and keeps on applying pressure for the same.
So, the Swami applies pressure on the family, and given that this is a conservative family, everybody immediately comes under pressure. Except for Sandhya, the rest of the family is shocked, and whenever something bad happens (which can happen even in a normal course of events), the incident is blamed on the curse given by the swami. And the Swami gives them very little time for recovering the jewels of the goddess and asks them to return the jewels or face a punishment, and even the neighbors believe all this, and see the miracles brought forward by the Swami, and blame the family.
Sandhya, with the help of Suraj, Chotu, and Chaturi cannot accept that things such as miracles can happen, and decides to investigate as to what has happened, and there is an urgency since there is the potential of very serious trouble hanging on top of their head if the jewels are not recovered. The problem is that the Swami has indeed buried the jewels in their house and they will get in serious trouble.
So Sandhya decides to pay back the Swami in his coin, using science in the guise of faith and miracles, and starts to twist the Swami around. She does some miracles of her own, including getting a coconut to break only when the Swami is holding it in his hand, putting water on the ground for some hours till the jewels automatically rise out of the ground (as if the goddess has produced the jewels in response to her prayers).
She then reveals the truth behind these miracles, that the earth splitting and jewels coming out was because of watering of grain till they absorbed water and arose pushing up the jewels which were on top. Similarly, the crying of the statue of the goddess when Bhabho offered prayers was because of a chemical that was activated by extra heat, and so on.
She also reveals that the Swmi was just a person called Govind who was trying to get a mall constructed, and the reason that he was after their family was because they had got a stay order filed against him in court and this was a way to get them to back down.

Hindi TV Serial - Diya Aur Bati Hum - Sandhya manages to get the truth

Diya Aur Bati Hum sometimes meanders on and on, and can get boring to watch sometimes. How long can you see a person, a well educated girl, getting humiliated by her mother-in-law and others in the family, suffering, and yet managing to do good for the others in the family, getting them out of trouble. The biggest problem for Sandhya is the attitude of her mother-in-law who has conservative beliefs. Bhabho believes that it is the role of the bahu of the house to ensure that the house is running well, to produce the offspring that will take the house ahead, and not to get into matters such as getting too educated or to try to get a job. And this is the biggest problem in the house, with Sandhya wanting to get more educated, to become a police officer as she wants. Her husband Suraj is also totally behind her in this and has actually gone behind his mother's back in getting her admitted to night school. When they tell this to Bhabho, she was shocked, and finally agrees to this with the condition that if Sandhya makes 3 mistakes, then she will be turned out of the house.
Another major problem for Sandhya is Mina, the other daughter-in-law of the house, who is forever on the case of Sandhya. She wants to get Sandhya in trouble and keeps on doing stuff, and keeps on getting exposed on a regular basis. However, Bhabho knows about Meena's nature and tries to prevent Mina from saying stuff that is meant to get Sandhya in trouble, and does not leave a change to tell off Meena when she sees Meena upto something.
Now, the latest issue is about the illness of Meena's baby, something which was caused by the fraud medicines that was being taken by Meena to get a boy, something that her doctor did not know about which was causing the problems to Meena. In addition, other problems including a scooter accident that Mohit had, and also a sum of Rs. 70,000 stolen from Suraj's account (withdrawn from the ATM). This is complicated since a sadhu baba claims that there is a curse upon them, something that both Suraj and Sanadhya do not accept, but the rest of the family believes that the curse is correct, and the problems happening are because of that bad luck.
Finally, Sandhya is able to prove that the amount was actually stolen by Meena since she gets the bank to send photos of Meena in the ATM, something that shocks the rest of the family. Meena is horrified that this was found, and then starts claiming that Bhabho has always discriminated against her and forgiven Sandhya so many times.

Hindi TV Serial - Diya Aur Bati Hum - Trying to get Sandhya admitted to night college

Suraj is very serious about getting Sandhya to live up to her ambition, with her ambition being that of becoming an IPS officer. For that purpose, she would need to go to college, complete it, and all that is very difficult given her current position. Except for her husband Suraj, no one else in the house supports her ambition, and she herself is not trying to think that she can every do so. Bhabho is doing everything possible to prevent Sandhya from taking steps in that direction, and also trying to dissuade Suraj from doing so (she has realized that even though Suraj listens to her, on this subject, he is not really listening to her and will continue on his quest to get Sandhya her education and then her ambition).
In between, there was a problem that happened whereby Bhabho had sent Suraj off with Chavi to her future in-laws place, and in his haste to come back to fill Sandhya's form, Chavi was out of his control for 3 hours; during that time an expensive piece of jewellery for misplaced and Chavi spun it around, blaming Suraj for not being present. It was Sandhya who found a photo that showed Chavi with the jewellery, and went and blasted Chavi for the same; Chavi had to then come and apologize to Suraj for what happened.
In the meantime, Suraj was able to figure out where the jewellery was lost and managed to get it back and then gave it to Bhabho; and this time Chavi was more in favor of Suraj which surprised Bhabho to some extent since Chavi was blaming Suraj only a day back. In the meantime, Mina was upto some problems on her side, since she wanted to have a son, and decided  to visit a local quack who gave some fake medicines and also told her not to have the medicines that she was currently consuming; future episodes would surely show some problems emerging from this decision of Meena.

Hindi TV Serial - Diya Aur Bati Hum - Struggle for Suraj to get Sandhya admitted to college

The struggle is not something that the serial has given up on. Right from the launch of the serial, the story has been based on the struggle in the life of an educated girl, Sandhya, who gets married to a guy who is great at heart but is not as well educated as her, and who comes from a conservative family. So the struggle remains on, with Sandhya winning her hard mother-in-law's heart who sees the good nature in Sandhya, but who also needs to be forever aware that the ambition that Sandhya has to become an IPS office does not cause her to break her family. Bhabho is fully confident that if Sandhya becomes an IPS officer, it will cause huge changes to the family life of her son, Suraj, and hence is opposing any further education for Sandhya.
She tries out different tactics to achieve this result, including sending her son to take care of his sister when she is on a visit to her future in-laws place, on the day which is the last day of submission of form for college, with the hope that this will cause no admission in college. However, her son is determined that he will fulfil the ambition that Sandhya's family had for her, and will get her educated and a police officer. So he even decides to come back for some time from his sister's inlaws place so as to get the form filled and submitted.
During this time, some jewellery goes missing and everybody scolds him for this, with even his sister Chavi, stepping in and demanding that Suraj account for the 3 hours that he went missing. He freely admits that he came back to get the form filled and even when Bhabho is scolding him badly, he says that he will get her ambitions fulfilled and make her an IPS officer, even replying back to Bhabho and walking away from there. So, there is some tension in the air, and Bhabho must also be very worried, with her eldest and best son not agreeing to her wishes on this particular subject (and she has counselled Sandhya many times on the difference between a family life and being ambitious). Soon after Sandhya catches Chavi red handed in terms of the circumstances where the jewellery was lost and gets her to admit to Suraj about what happened.

Hindi TV Serial - Diya Aur Bati Hum - Bhabho concerned over praise to Sandhya

The serial continues to show the social situation in small town India, which is conservative and where woman have to face the brunt of not being treated equally. Woman are supposed to be eventually married off and sent off to their husband's house to live, and take care of his family members. This had led to a condition where they are not treated equally, not provided the same amount of education and other such benefits as the male members of the family. While this may seem unfair and something that the Government and society needs to continue to do to make fair, this is a reality that is depicted in a number of serials that are now showing up more and more in current serials.
In the current case, there is an unstated fear that Sandhya, even though she was married and had not mentioned her education again, would again want to move ahead with her education. Bhabho has a big fear that Sandhya will get awakened again some time about her ambitions, and with suraj also supporting her, she will want to start working again towards her education as well as joining the IPS. With the actions taken by Sandhya to prevent a terrorist attack in the city, there is a lot of recognition and commendations coming her way, which makes the family happen; but Bhabho is concerned. She also tells Sandhya that she wanted Lakshmi, not Durga or Kali in her home. Which means that she wanted a home maker in her family, not somebody who will play a public profile.
So, there is some amount of tension in the house, with Bhabho not comfortable with the public functions that are being organized in favor of Sandhya, although Bhabhasa and Suraj are very comfortable with this. Also, Sandhya gets some very good news in terms of her brother and sister-in-law having a daughter (something which Bhabho mentions as not being as good as having a son), and leaves for sometime to take care of them.

Hindi TV Serial - Diya Aur Bati Hum - Suraj back after successfully participating in World Top Cook

The show decided to send the family abroad, and which would also give the viewers a look at an international city; and so initially when Sandhya proposed that Suraj take part in a cooking contest, there was hesitation. Suraj himself was not convinced, but over a period of time, everybody agreed. And then Suraj won the local round of the show, getting selected to go to the international finale of the show, being held in Singapore. As part of the rules of the show, he was able to take along his wife, and his parents; and all of them got a chance to go to Singapore and stay in the most posh hotel over there, the Marina Bay Sands.
There were many challenges even just being there, since neither Suraj nor his parents knew English or other customs prevalent in Singapore, and that is another reason where an educated daughter-in-law in the form of Sandhya was able to provide incredible help. She took on the role of explaining to Suraj everything that was happening, and did not lose sight of their local customs as well (such as when she and Bhabho observed a fast, or observed Teej over there when a party was also ongoing).
The international cooking contest was a bit of drama, since it seemed a bit fake even though it was just part of a serial, and over a number of events, the cooking abilities of Suraj were able to fascinate everybody, even though some other participants were trying to put him down, or in the finale, one of them even tried to accuse him of spoiling her dish. So, now the contest is over, and Suraj is back, and they are showing him getting welcomed with celebrations, and so on. What was strange were the brief attempts being made to showcase this in real life as an achievement, since this was a fictional episode in a serial.

Hindi TV Serial - Diya Aur Bati Hum - The contest in Singapore and language issues

So, Suraj cleared the first part of the cookery contest in Delhi and has now been cleared to attend the international finals in Singapore. And for this, he can take 3 more people along - these being Sandhya, Bhabho and Bhabhasa. The problematic part is that except for Sandhya, none of them know English and even many machinery is different - for example, the washroom is different, the induction cooker used in the competition is different, and so on. Without Sandhya, there would not have been any hope for any of them.
Anyhow, they have ended up in the flight to Singapore, and apart from some anxiety on the flight, things are uneventful. Also, Bhabo is unused to how the washroom works, and when there is a mess inside the bathroom, a lady scolds Bhabho before it gets revealed that it was a child who made the mess inside the washroom. Sandhya then scolds the lady roundly.
In a party as part of the competition, Bhabho and the others are apprehensive, since there is non-vegetarian food also being served as part of the menu, but Sandhya takes them to another part of the hall where vegetarian food is available. And then the competition begins, where Suraj wants to make jalebi as the starting dish. However, he is unused to an induction cooker, and the oil gets too hot, and the jalebis are burnt.

Hindi TV Serial - Diya Aur Bati Hum - Suraj and Sandhya heading to Delhi for the cooking competition

Some change in the serial, there will be some time when there will be more of Suraj and Sandhya and less of the politics of the household. For the past several days, ever since there was the news of a cooking contest and Sandhya inspired Suraj to take part in the contest, the happenings in the house have been focused on the cooking contest. To some extent, there was resistance in the house, with Mohit mocking Suraj until he got a blasting from Bhabho about this. On the other side, Bhabho herself was not comfortable with the cooking contest and Sandhya found out from Bhabho the reason for this - apparently Suraj had once lost a race in his early days and carried the defeat for quite some time; Bhabho did not want him to suffer like this.
On the + side, Bhabhasa and Chotu were full supporters of the scheme to send Suraj for the cooking contest, that too it being an international cooking contest and very prestigious. Suraj himself was some hesitant, but Sandhya kept on pushing him and he agreed.
Bhabho does not want others in the locality to know about this, since there will be a number of people who will talk about this, and she does not want others to talk about this, so when Daisa comes to the house, Bhabho changes the conversation - she also tells Meena separately that she should not try any of her tactics about this cooking contest.

Hindi TV Serial - Diya Aur Bati Hum - Meena's lies are exposed in front of Bhabho

For quite some time now, the various lies told by Meena have only increased trouble for Sandhya, such as the mystery about the police complaint (which was blamed on Sandhya) and also the contraceptive pills, and then also trying to poison the mind of Bhabho against Sandhya from time to time. Some times Bhabho would listen to these, many times she would not, but in the end, Bhabho already had negative sentiments about Sandhya and those came out in her tirades against Sandhya.
However, it was the trip by Vikram and Meena to Mt. Abu which caused them a lot of problems. In addition to being arrested by the police (for which Suraj went there and scolded them a lot of lying), Sandhya managed to solve the case of the police complaint and find out that it was Meena who did this. Finally when Meena comes back to the house from the police station, Bhabho questions her and the truth is out about the police complaint, and that leads to an incredible drama in the house.
Meena tries to deflect this anger by claiming that she should not be thrown out of the house because she has the next generation, that she is pregnant, and then make the next mistake by revealing that the contraceptive pills were actually hers, and she was blaming Sandhya for them. Now she is deep trouble, but Sandhya saves the day for her by talking to the others and telling them since she has the grand-child, she should remain in the house and even carrying food for her. Will this mean that Bhabho will now start liking Sandhya ?
Also, the serial seems to moving towards a time leap where Sandhya will finally achieve her dreams of becoming a police officer.

Hindi tv serial - Diya aur bati hum - Finally Sandhya is exposing the truth to Bhabho

For quite some time, the relations between Bhabho and Sandhya have been poisoned with the belief by Bhabho that Sandhya was responsible for the police complaint of harassment that got Bhabho jailed. Even though now the relations between Bhabho and Sandhya are not so heavily strained, there are still a lot of issues in the relationship, and it needs the expose that Meena is responsible for this complaint to bring about resolution of the relationship. Now, this would be really traumatic for Meena, since Bhabho does not have a high opinion of Meena either.

However, things are getting even more complex for Vikram and Meena. They want to spend some time away from the home, but it would not be easy since getting to spend a holiday away can be problematic. So they make an excuse and decide to go to Mt. Abu. However, they make a wrong selection of hotel, selecting a hotel that is typically used for single night liaisons, or even by the hour. So, dutifully there is a police raid in which they are caught, while they are drunk, and spend the night in the police station. When they come to their senses, they realize the problem they are in, and are told by the police officer that they can be left off if they show their marriage certificate. Meena has a fit since she realizes that if Bhabho gets to know, there will be hell to pay. However, they call Suraj, since they do need help, and Suraj is angry at the lie, but comes to get them out of jail without telling the reason to anyone.

At home, when Sandhya gets to hear after they have lied about the place, she makes a connection with a name that was used the last time as well, and decides to do more sleuthing. All this investigation leads her to Meena's name, and she is angry at the fact that Meena filed a complaint against Bhabho and wants to punish her. On the other hand, Bhabho is angry that Sandhya spend a lot of time outside the house without telling her, and in the confrontation, finally Sandhya tells them that the complaint was filed by Meena, and it was Sandhya who talked to the magistrate and got the complaint dismissed.

Hindi TV Serial - Diya Aur Bati Hum - The reunion of Suraj and Sandhya

The confrontation between Suraj and Sandhya was reaching critical heights. It was apparent to everyone in the house (and even to outsiders) that there was huge turmoil between Suraj and Sandhya, and that Suraj, far from supporting her in the past as he used to do, was instead the one who was pushing Sandhaya out of the house. Bhabhasa was the only one who knew the reason as to why Suraj as behaving like he was, but was unable to tell the reason for the same. Even Bhabho was astounded when she came to know about the behavior that Suraj was exhibiting.
And so it happens that Suraj drives her out of the house, even though he suffers great pain from what happened; on the other hand Sandhaya is horrified at what is happening to her. But they finally call her brother and tell him that she will be leaving the house. And they depart, with Sandhaya being put in a bus to leave from there.
And then the turnaround happens ? Suraj learns that the bus in which Sandhaya left had an accident and is now searching for her, and then he finds her. And in this time of high emotion, the truth comes out from both sides, with Suraj learning that it was not Sandhaya who was behind the divorce papers, but her friend Preeti. He also tells her the reason for his behavior, and thus they decide to come back to the house where they are welcomed by all the house members.

Hindi TV Serial - Diya aur Bati Hum - Finally, a confrontation between Sandhya and Suraj

For a long time now, the serial has been showing Suraj being the supporter of Sandhya in the house, even when Bhabho was trying to kick her out of the house. However, ever since Suraj saw the divorce papers, he was shocked and his behavior was totally changed. From that time on, his behavior towards Sandhya had changed. He decided that his family and his own self was not suitable for Sandhya, and wanted to reach a set of conditions where she would leave the house and then would be able to whatever she wanted to do. As a result, from that time on, he would put a lot more pressure on Sandhya, scolding her in public when something happened, or would blame her for things that in the past he would have supported. This was a shocker to Sandhya, and even to his own family members, specifically to Bhabhasa; and finally Bhabhasa decided to confront Suraj about what happened for his change in behavior and Suraj tells him the real reason, about letting Sandhya go.
However, things reach a head at the proposed marriage of Chavi, where everybody suspects that it was because of Sandhya that the marriage got postponed by 1 year, and there is a public confrontation. However, with Bhabhasa about to get involved, Suraj calls her to the room and then confronts her about the divorce papers and then refuses to listen to whatever she had to say, and finally says that he is turning her out of the house.

Hindi TV Serial - Diya Aur Bati Hum - Necklace lost, Bhabho blames Sandhya and Ankur for this one

As usual, the serial keeps on showing one drama after another. When the serial started, there was a feeling that it would be different, however, it is settling into the usual sort of drama, with the setting being changed. There is the suffering bahu, the silent men who do not interfere, and there is the saas who runs the house (and then there is the person who in the house is the source of most of the wrong that happens). There is one episode after another, but yet the bahu continues to suffer and be tormented.
After the episode in the village, where after some initial condemnation by maasa, Sandhya manages to save the marriage through some education of those involved (with of course support from the brother-in-law of the groom); she gets the full support of maasa who tells Bhabho that Sandhya has her full support and Bhabho has got the right bahu.
Bhabho of course continues to be against Sandhya to a large degree, and with Suraj providing support, but mostly of a silent nature (except when Bhabho wanted to turn out Sandhya and Suraj refused to let that happen). In the current episode, Sandhya had jewellery out of which one of them goes missing after she had given them to Bhabho for keeping. Bhabho is very angry over the loss of the jewellery, and in the beginning believes that Sandhya has the jewellery set; and then actually believes that Ankur (Sandhya's brother) was needing a loan and then suddenly did not want a loan (and this would be because Sandhya would have given him the necklace for money purposes). She calls Ankur to the house.
Sandhya is totally aghast at this allegation, and does not let Ankur enter the house since she says that discussions related to the house should remain the house rather than being discussed outside the house. And then Suraj seems some photos in the camera that show Meena with the necklace; but will he expose everything ?