There was a time when PTV plays like Shama, Waris, Khuda Ki Basti, Alif Noon, Andhera Ujala, Unkahi and Tanhaiyan had deserted streets in nearly all the cities in Pakistan at its transmission time. The craze to see these plays was such that a wedding in Mauripur was delayed because everyone was watching a serial. The groom and his baratis requested the bride’s family that they wanted to watch Andhera Ujala, the famous drama serial of Lahore, starring Qavi Khan Jamil Fakhri and Irfan Khoosat, which highlighted the performance of the police department. This was the time when cable TV had not made its appearance.
As far as revenues were concerned, some serials of PTV were sponsored by as many as 32 companies in those days. These serials were just as popular across the border. People in India hired video cassettes of Pakistani plays and smuggled them every week, to watch the latest episodes of PTV plays.
An old video shop owner of Karachi says that he used to record PTV play, Unkahi’s episode every week and his brother would send the video cassette to various cities in India through the first available flight here. The receiver in India made copies of these cassettes for renting. Viewers in Mumbai (formerly Bombay) lined up outside video shops to hire the cassettes of the latest episodes of Pakistani plays some years ago.
When the government allowed Shalimar Recording Company to start a private channel, NTM, every Tom, Dick and Harry became a producer and started making TV plays for NTM. There were very few producers who did quality work for the private channel. Competition became tough for PTV and finally PTV also started buying privately produced plays for its transmission. With the invasion of dish and cable TV, NTM which was giving a hard time to PTV, started losing its viewers as well and today, Indian channels have hijacked nearly all the TV viewers in Pakistan.
Some of the Indian TV plays on Star Plus and Zee TV channels such as Amanat, Ashirwaad, Kahani Ghar Ghar Ki and Kyun Kay Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi have become a household name for Pakistani viewers, particularly women. Some women in Pakistan couldn’t control their emotions and burst into tears when the hero of the play Kyun Kay Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi was shown to have died in a car accident. It had the same impact in India also and the producer had to change the script and bring back the hero again.
As far as the quiz programmes are concerned, no doubt Pakistani compere Tariq Aziz successfully conducted popular quiz show Neelaam Ghar for 20 long years. When Indian TV channel, Star Plus launched its quiz show Kaun Banega Crorepati (KBC) sometime back, it took the TV viewers by storm in the first quarter of the year. The popularity of this quiz show in Pakistan can be judged from the amount of sponsorship it enjoys from Pakistani companies. When KBC completed its first anniversary, fans of Amitabh Bachchan in the Indian city of Kolkata (formerly Calcutta) not only made a wax statue of KBC’s anchor, but also worshipped it. They even expressed their intention to build a temple in Amitabh Bachchan’s honour.
One of the episode of KBC telecast on 7th May, 2001, featured a couple from Orissa who were roll-over contestants of the earlier programme. In this programme they answered all the questions correctly and won the jackpot of 10 million rupees. Earlier, a Mumbai contestant had won ten million rupees. The KBC episode of May 7, had four short breaks during which 23 advertisements went on air repeatedly. The interesting thing to note was that all these advertisements were of Pakistani companies.
The KBC programme that followed the next day had the same sponsors. These sponsorships not only deprived the Pakistani government and PTV of entertainment revenue but also caused the country huge loss of foreign exchange as these channels demand advertising charges from the sponsoring companies in US dollars. Isn’t it ridiculous that on one hand our government is threatening TV viewers of dire consequences if they don’t get their TV licences made, on the other hand, Indians are becoming corepatis with the revenue of the government of Pakistan?
What is it that is lacking on our channels and is available on the Indian ones that is stealing our viewers? We must remember that PTV excelled in its plays not too long ago, so its not that we don’t have the know-how and experience for smash serials. If we dig deep enough we can discover that vested interests have moved in.
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(Article published in weekly IMAGES of DAWN on 23 Dec-2001)