Saloni Ka Safar: Same story again

Somehow the concept of Saath Phere - Saloni ka Safar keeps on going through the same phases. Initially, the serial was all about the struggle of a dark colored girl, Saloni (Rajshree Thakur) against the prejudices that seemed to be against people with dark complexions. She had to struggle against her own parents who favor her fairer sister. In addition, her quest for a marriage partner was a big struggle.
However, I have the serial all worked out now. The serial will essentially capture one by one, a series of stories whereby Saloni will be forced down a path whereby she has to struggle to go with her convictions, She has to live by the truth as she knows it, even though she has to forsake support from her family. So, for example, in the latest incident, Saloni's sister-in-law, Priya was estranged from her husband and had to work make her living. One day, she was raped by somebody, and eventually suspicion fell on her estranged husband. Everybody believed this except for Saloni. Manno Bhabhi has recovered her long lost son Abhi and is very happy, and is even happier when Abhi marries Priya. Then Saloni gets to know that Abhi had raped Priya, and is shocked, but accuses him. And then then inevitable happens. Her in-laws, and even her own father forsake her because of these accusations and don't believe her. So she has to struggle all alone to prove this.
These are the kinds of struggles that Saloni has to go through for the sake of living for the truth, and my belief is that as soon as a particular set of problems are resolved and Saloni is proved right, she moves into the next set of problems where again she has to struggle, people don't believe her, and so on.

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):

Zaara: The only major Muslim serial on air

For a country that has a significant Muslim population, there are never too many serials on air that are based on a Muslim setting. One of the prime serials on air now that is based on a Muslim family is called Zaara – Pyaar Ki Saugat, and is about the choices having to be made in life by a young lady, about the choice between love and family. Sounds familiar, does it not? Most serials on air are about choices, sacrifice, and so on. Well, Zaara – Pyaar Ki Saugat, also has all that, in the sense that it also has all the usual stuff about back-biting, jealousy between relatives and sisters, second marriage, and so on.



The serial appears on Sahara One at 8 PM every weekday, Monday to Friday, and is part of the effort by Sahara One to bring in many more serials so as to get more user TRP's. The story so far is fairly simple. Being set in an upper middle class Muslim family, the lead character played by Samiksha Jug was a student abroad in London, and has now returned to her hometown after completing her studies. While in London, she was in love with her childhood sweetheart, Samar (Abhay Vakil), and was all prepared to get married to him.
When she comes back to her hometown, she is plunged into an ethical dilemna. Her adopted sister, Zeenat (Malini Kapoor) is childless in marriage, and married to Aamir (Jatin Grewal). Zaara is waiting for Samar to come back from London and ask for her hand in marriage, when Zeenat comes in and asks for a favour. The favour is a big one, with Zaara being asked to marry Aamir so that they can have a child. In these days of surrogate mothers, of fertility and IVF treatments, one wonders why they still need to go in for a second marriage.
Updates on the serial, including videos of episodes and updates on a day-to-day basis of the story can be had from these forums. Essentially, the story has now evolved to another serial of conspiracies, acting against each other, good vs. evil, with all 4 of them, Zaara, Zeenat, Aamir and Samar now involved. No longer a serial with a difference.

Raavan, a different kind of serial

There is a serial on Zee, which can be truly called a serial with a difference. There have been a number of serials on air to do with mythology, with most of them being loud, very flashy costumes, big dialogues, etc, not at all subtle. But there is now a serial with a difference. Ravan attempts to tell the history that no one knows about, the story of Ravan, the embodiment of evil. The makers have tried to present his entire history, including many of his positive points. The attempt of the makers is that the serial will not glorify Ravan. It will simply give Ravan's point of view - why he abducted Rama's wife Sita - without justifying what he did. The serial will show Ravan's transformation from mahamanav (a great human being) to a mahadanav (a great demon).
“Ravan has been portrayed in a negative light so far. He is known as Sita’s kidnapper but what people don’t know is that he was a big pandit and a powerful man. His real persona has been hidden from the audience and in this show you will see him as a warrior, a real hero!” The serial will reveal little-known aspects about Ravan like the fact that he was the grandson of Brahma, that Hanuman was one of the ministers in his court who left after a misunderstanding, and that Ravana did not actually have ten heads; he actually wore a necklace of ten heads.



‘Ravan’ is shown Saturday nights at 9 PM (and started on 21:00 from 12th November 2006). Basic story starts with Ravan's mother Kekashi (Ravee Gupta) shown trying to seduce Rishi Vishrava (R K Gupta), because she wants to have a child with him. It all began with the Daitya named Sumaalee ( maternal Grand Father), Raavan’s Nana. After Sumaalee lost his kingdom the Devta’s, he was very upset and started to conspire and wanted his kingdom back at any cost.
He got a vision that if he had son’s from Vishravaa, he would have sons equal to Kuber the ruler of lanka. Sumaalee’s daughter Kaikasee, was convinced to go and entice Vishravaa into marrying her and has children from him. Kaikasee went to seek out for Vishravaa, and managed to win his love. After some time she gave birth to a 4 children. His father named him Dashgreev (ten-headed). Then born Kumbhkarn and after him their sister Shoorpankhaa. Kaikasee’s last child was Vibheeshan.
Having watched it many times, it can be gripping, and because of the previous mythological serials, I was a bit apprehensive. But to connect to the 21st century, the loud drama of the 80s’ Doordarshan presentation has been cut out. Ravan speaks human. There is no thigh-slapping, foot-stomping swearing of a bigmouth. He is younger and leaner. Rama looks like a conscientious leader not given to lengthy discourse and beatific smiles.
The serial is also raising a toast to scientific progress of the age. “The sages, like Agastya Rishi, were actually great scientists. Why speak of only Ravan’s Pushpak rath? There were nine types of aircraft in vogue then, including fighter planes. The Brahmastra itself was a missile. It is well-known that centuries later Leonardo da Vinci was influenced by military accounts in Ramayana.
An excerpt from the serial that shows the inherent nature of Rama. Rama has picked up the Brahmastra and taken aim, but Ravana has desisted from countering with an equally destructive weapon from his arsenal. “I cannot let Creation come to end,” he thinks and embraces his own death.

Producer : Gulshan Sachdeva ( Film and Shots )
Research : Om Prakash
Screenplay Writer : Umesh Chandra Upadhyay
Dialogue Writer : Vijay Pundit
Director : Ranjan Kumar Singh
Star Cast : Narendra Jha (Ravan), Divya Desai (Mandodari), Ravee Gupta (Keksi), Rajendra Gupta (Sumali)