I belong to an era which saw the virtual explosion of many firsts -- Cable TV, Mobiles, Internet, Smart Phones, DTH TV, and many more. Also I belong to an era which saw the rise and fall of many a TV serials which ran into years of telecasts and whose stories would wound so much around the "central theme" that eventually the theme would be lost to what can be called "mediocrity of story lines". Anyways more about them a bit later.
HUM LOG, CIRCUS, NUKKAD and many such serials are a product of bygone era. As a child I saw them, never really understood much about them but still enjoyed. The simplicity of NUKKAD and later NAYA NUKKAD; Mungerilal ke Haseen Sapney, etc., still strikes a chord. Why to go so much back into the future, even serials like Shrimaan Shrimati were so much fun to watch.
How many of you remember "Surabhi" and Turning Point? I remember it vividly. One of my earliest source of knowledge was these two serials. Surabhi and its anchors Siddhartha Kak and Renuka Shahne would mesmerize us for the entire show and take us to places and lands unknown. And who can forget the anchoring of Girish karnad in Turning Point. Scientific knowledge presented in such a beautiful manner.
Fast forward to the years after 2000. With the advent of Cable and now DTH TV the number of channels have simply exploded. From the virtual no choice except DD National and DD Metro now we had well over a 100 channels. Spoilt for choices the number of serials went up exponentially. And from utterly simple serials we are now faced with the new craps known as SAAS BAHU serials.
Every other serial starts with a different theme. Balika Badhu; Kahani Ghar Ghar Ki; Kyuni ... Saas bhi kabhi bahu this; and now the same stories packaged with different names and characters are being presented between 8:00 pm to 12:00 pm... And not just hindi, but even Bangla channels have started to copy the same ideas.
Except for a couple of serials most dwell on almost the same story line. And ya writing a story is so much easy now.
Throw in a mother-in-law from Monster Inc. and add a NANAD (sis-in-law)... throw in a couple of brothers both married; add a daughter in law who is so quite that Manmohan Singh would get blushes; torture, both mental and physical, is endured in the name of parampara; The wierdo in-laws are shown constantly making schemes to malign the daughter in law and whoever they can think of for apparantly unknown reasons; suddenly there is a twist in the tale.
The actor might have demanded higher wages so an accident occurs and the age old system of AMNESIA + PLASTIC SURGERY is applied and an entire new story line is started parallel to the main line. By the time the new actor with a new face is integrated back to the main story the viewer has essentially forgotten what the main theme of the story was.
Never understood one thing; if plastic surgeries really dole out such fantastic faces then why cant they be applied to the n-number of burn victime scattered all across the globe??? Seems the TV producers have acquired the surgeons from outer space!!!! Hmmm alien contacts.
And Amnesia. God.... its so easy to forget everything and remember it back too after the TRPs have evened out again.
And the effect all this has on the WOMEN of our nation???
My mother feels perpetually that one day I will definitely kick her out of the house after forcing her to sign on the papers !!!! What papers??? God only knows. Or may be the producer of the serial she got inspired from.
My mother and wife fight at times and I watch them rather with a feeling of respect and awe.... both are perfect emulators of the fights I have seen them watch on the Prime Time TV sops. They are becoming experts.
A girl is sitting on a temple stair case; a boy playfully places a garland around her neck; some stupid ritual says the girl now has to marry the boy or she risks being made into a devdasi; the girl manages to push the boy into marrying her; and now when after many twists and turns she is finally settled into the boys family comes the ex-girlfriend of the boy to jeopardize their marriage.
Last two years I am forced to watch this stupid confusion at night and when I switched off the TV when this serial was being telecasted I was shouted at. I simple asked, " Don't you guys get bored watching this shit?". Came the reply, "After the entire day we need to be entertained"...
I always thought that entertainment was to lighten you up. Songs, dances, humour, thrill, adventure etc., seems to qualify as entertaining stuff. But in-laws scheming to throw out the daughter from the house; one girl scheming to throw our another married one out of her marriage; a lady Manmohan Singh enduring the taunts and torture...... and you call this Entertainment???!!!!!
I call it a blatant violation of the most intricate piece of invention by mother nature..... Human Mind.
What do you say???
