Hindi Serial - Jhansi ki Rani - Manu Bai is married to the King, and projects a strong image

The serial is about the historical figure called Jhansi Ki Rani (the serial is actually called 'Ek Veer Stree ki Kahaani Jhansi Ki Rani'), the lady who was prominent for her fight in the First Indian War of Independence of 1857 against the British. She was a lady who got married to king, and they could not have a natural heir. The British did not recognize the adopted heir that they had, and took over the kingdom when the King died. Opposing this, the Laxmibai led a revolt against the British. However, the serial seeks to portray that the fight against the British was not only from the time that they took over her kingdom, but something that was ingrained in her from the time that she was a small child, when she had setup a small group of kids to fight against the British.
In the current situation, Manu Bai has done a number of fights against the British, and they suspect her of being behind some of the attacks against them. And then she gets married to the King (the King is a middle aged adult and she is a young child, shown to be much wiser, but physically still young); however, just because she is young does not mean that she will allow herself to be pushed over. There is opposition to her from within the king's household as well as from the British resident, but she manages to make a relationship with the king, including insisting on a direct way to contact the King when necessary.
She is again invoking her fight against the British, opposing the influence of the British in the kingdom. In the latest such incident, she leads a fight against the efforts of the British resident to move the treasury (the Khazana) to some other location, enlisting the help of Sumer Singh in take back the khazana. However, she is seen by the King; will he manage to penetrate her veil and discover her secret.

Chanakya, a serial from the past

In the midst of so many serials about troubles within the family, about the serials that explore the relationship between a mother-in-law and daughter-in-law (saas bahu) and the constant problems between them, one sometimes get a wish (driven by nostalgia) for some of the serials that appeared on Doordarshan. One of these was Chanakya; and why am I thinking of Chanakya ? Because while I was browsing on YouTube, I came across some videos of Chanakya (watch them here), and that activated the section of brain dealing with memory.
I remember Chanakya for many things. At a time when serials based on ancient India or mythology were mainly costume dramas with a heavy focus on heavy language, where every other sentence referred to honour or the lack of it, here was a serial heavy on political drama. While in school, we learnt in a few short paragraphs (or maybe it was one chapter, I don't remember) about who Chanakya was and what he had done. However, as far as I can recall about what we were taught, we were primarily taught that Chanakya was the writer of the 'Arthashastra, the book on Indian politics and that he was a very clever tactician who brought his favorite king to power.
However, it was the serial that presented things in a slightly different (maybe it was just more detailed) context, labeling Chanakya (known as so because his father was called Chanak) (also known as Kautilya or Vishnugputa) as a person who was inspired by a mission to bring the country together after the invasion of Alexander (or Yakshendra as I remember the name being pronounced in the serial). Just like the Discovery of India series (Bharat ek khoj) brought the history of Indian to everyone, this serial brought the life of times of one of India's greatest thinkers and tactician to the screen.
The serial essentially captures the rise of Chanakya in those time when the Nandas were the rulers (but not very skilful). They had a superb minister, almost to the level of Chanakya himself, called Rakshas. Rakshas was able through his actions to keep the Nandas in power and ensure that no one was able to plan or execute any actions against the Nandas. It was Chanakya, a ruthless person in his mission, who was able to weld together the different states, defeat the Nandan and bring his brave protege, Chandragupta Maurya to power.
There are many examples of his determined nature shown in the serial, but the most famous of them have to be the episode of where when grass hurts his feet, he gets the grass eaten by ants; and probably the most famous one where he makes a solemn vow not to tie his hair till he has got rid of the Nandas.
The serial seemed to be very well-researched, and spent a lot of time and effort to make the entire portrayal including the sets seem authentic. The director and lead actor (Dr. Chandraprakash Dwivedi) essayed the role in a way that seemed to be very authentic (including the fact that people rode horses bare-back since the saddle was not yet introduced in India). One person who did not come off so well in this serial was Alexander, since the serial also mentions his brutality many times. People will also be surprised to know that the serial was somewhat controversial at its time because of the large use of saffron flags particularly because there was already a lot of feelings about the ongoing rise of the BJP and the Ram Janmabhoomi agitation.

Strange Sa Re Ga Ma Pa episode - Post Independence Day Special

On the 11th of August, there was the Independence Day Special on Sa Re Ga Ma Pa on Zee TV with Kapil Dev being the star guest. Now the reasonable expectation is that on an Independence Day Special, there will be a lot of patriotism on display. What would make it interesting is the fact that there are 3 Pakistanis competing, and it would be difficult for Pakistanis to sing India independence songs. Now, this could be a political thing, in the sense that the Indian Independence struggle brought independence to both India and Pakistan.
However, this is still a competition involving singing, and getting voted on by the public, and while the rest of the singers sung rousing patriotic songs, these 3 folks sang songs that were either slower, or not heard before by a large section of the population. I can play these 3 songs below:

Junaid singing 'Mere Dushman Mere Bhai' from Border:



Mussarat singing 'Dil Na Lage'



Amanat Ali singing 'Ae Watan Pyare Watan' by 'Amanat Ali Khan Sahab'



Now what happened after this, for the next week where the voting results were calculated is that all of these 3 singers (and are pretty good singers) were voted to be the lowest vote getters, with one of them guaranteed to get eliminated. Now this placed the organizers in a piquant situation, after all, if suddenly all the 3 Pakistanis were rated lowest, then there would be a lot of noise about bias. At the same time, these were votes by people, who obviously did not appreciate the songs that were sung, and so voted them lowest. This led to emotional drama, and eventually a decision was taken that there was a lot of bias, a lot of rumours, and this would have made the results wrong. So, this week, nobody was eliminated, and the votes of this would be tabulated withe votes of next week to eliminate somebody next week.

See an excerpt of this drama (with audience, singers, all very emotional):

Left Right Left on Sab TV: Different from the usual

Rajeev Khandelwal gained prominence as the character playing 'Sujal' in the Balaji late-night serial, Kahin To Hoga. His character was extremely popular, and made him into a semi-star. Of course, his rumoured romance with his co-star, Aamna Shariff of Kahin To Hoga also hit the gossip news. And then, apparently miffed by the turn that the serial was taking, he quit the serial (forcing them to do the usual plastic surgery to get a new person on board). After this, he did a serial called 'Bomblast' which do not do any good.
And then he joined this serial about a military academy called 'Left right Left'. This serial started with many negatives, it was not a serial about family or saas-bahu, there were no big business deals and money of 100 crores casually being tossed around. In addition, it was appearing on Sab TV, which by itself does not have a very strong viewership. However, the serial did start catching on, given that it was heavily promoted, was like a breath of fresh air, and had new faces. In addition, it had a very catchy jingle.

Not the original video, but the tune is there:



The serial is about a military academy called 'Kanchenjunga Military Academy (KMA)' and is essentially about 6 cadets who are part of this academy, being instructed by Captain Rajveer Shekhawat (Rajeev Khandelwal). He is actually there in the academy to catch the spy, who is threatening to steal the nuclear trigger (imagine a nuclear trigger hidden in a military academy). Who is the spy ? It's actually Shweta Salve (who plays the role of Dr. Ritu, the psychiatrist on campus, although most military academies would not believe in the concept of a shrink). She looks terrific, it's too sad that she had to die at the end of season 1 after her truth was revealed. If she was not a spy, there was a good budding romance between her and Rajveer.
What about the other six cadets who are the focus of the serial ? Well, they are most unlike military cadets, not ramrod straight, very rebellious with one of them essentially hating Rajveer. Many times, they refuse to obey orders, and are hardly ever shown training; which makes the serial a bad inspiration to join the army. And I wonder who designed the costumes, given that female cadets do not wear skirts that end above the knee.
Well, some detail about the six cadets who joined the Kanchenjunga Military Academy – Amardeep Huda, is here as a result of a bet put by his mother, Alekh, a criminal who has been sent to the academy to get reformed, Pooja, who has joined the academy so that she can stay in Ambala where her boy friend rohit is suppose to be, Ali who is a third generation from his family to join the army, Yudi, who wants to show his parents he can be a man by joining the army and not going to USA.
Lastly Naina Singh Ahluwalia had joined KMA to find the person who was responsible for her brother’s death. She ended up being the first suspect of Captain Rajveer Shekhawat, who had come to find a spy in the academy. Captain Rajveer found out the truth about Naina that she was Naveen’s sister, his batchmate and one who was declared a traitor by the army. In turn, she found out that Captain Rajveer was the one who actually killed her brother, and her brother was also engaged to Dr. Ritu.
Now in season 2, it is not so popular now; suffering the same fate as other serials, having to push in twists and turns in the storyline so as to keep people interested, and there is only so much drama that you can show in a military academy without having to sacrifice reality.

Mile Sur Mera Tumhara: Nostalgia about Doordarshan

A long time back, Doordarshan used to run theme based short clips on national integrity, and they made a few that had an excellent direction and theme. For example, they had this 5 minute clip called Mile Sur Mera Tumhara and featured a number of people from different parts of the country, coming together as a conclusion in the shape of young kids assembling in the form of the national flag. The voice by Lata Mangeshkar was haunting, and overall, when you look at this now, it seems very click and well made.
Here is the YouTube version:




Lyrics of this song (although in English text):

Mile sur mera tumharaa, Thoo sur bane hamaraa.... sur kee nadhiyaan har disha se behkee saagar mein milee. Baadalon ka roop leiker bharse halke halke... Mile sur mera tumharaa.. thoo... sur bane hamaara.. Mile sur mera tumhara...
Chaain taraj tahin nyay tarajek but baniye saayen taraj
Tera sur mile mere sur de naalmilke bane ek nava surtaal
Mile sur mera tumharaa....tho sur bane hamaara..
Mohnja sur tohi desa pyara mile jadein geet ashaanjo madhur tarano bane tadein
Sur ka dariya bahte saagar me mile badlaan da roop leike barasan holle haule
Isaindhal namm iruvarin suramum namadhakum.. Dhisai veru aanalum aazi ser aarugal Mugilai mazaiyai pozivadu pol isai ...Namm isssaiiii.... Thik thakida thathikakidA....thaka thimi thaka junu
Nanna dhwanige ninna dhwani-ya, seridante namma dhwaniya..
Naa swaramu nee swaramu sangammamai, mana swaram ga avatarinchey
Ende swaramum ningalude swaramum otthucheiyum Namudeya swaramai....
Tomaar shoor moder shoor srishti koroor koi ekshoor[2]...
Sriishti karoon woi katha
Toma mora swarer milan srishti kare chalbochatano
Male sur jo taro maro, bane aapno sur niralo
Majhya tumchya julta tara madhur suranchya barasti dhara
Sur ki nadiya har disha se behke saagar mein mile...
Baadlo ka roop leke barse halke halke..
Oh...Mile sur mera tumhara tho....sur bane hamara...
Mile Sur mera tumharatho sur bane hamara tho sur bane hamaratho sur bane hamara