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Small screen's un-real love
On small screen love seems to have been redefined and tweaked to suit the palate of a mixed target audience group, scattered across ages and cities of India. So wholesome love stories that make you go weak-kneed or your heart beat faster are not welcome on daily soaps. In the top shows of GECs, the male and female protagonists rarely get lucky to share cosy, heartwarming romantic moments that many people in real life might actually do. That's also because on GECs the male leads are broadly categorized in two:
Rich handsome, arrogant and violent: Every dream heartthrob of television, from Angad of Kaisa Ye Pyaar Hai (Iqbal Khan), Sujal Grewal of Kahiin To Hoga ( Rajeev Khandelwal), Armaan Mallik of Dill Mill Gayye ( Karan Singh Grover), Maan Singh Khurana of Geet Hui Sabse Se Paraye (Gurmeet Choudhary), Arnav Singh Raizada of Iss Pyaar Ko Kya Naam Doon? (Barun Sobti) to Rishabh Kundra of Madhubala Ek Ishq Ek Junoon (Vivian D'sena) - has grabbed his lady love in a secluded corner, pushed her into a wall (literally too) and voiced his 'feelings' for her. The arrogant, mean and aggressive male protagonist who does a 360 degree turn when the uprighteous female protagonist storms in his life and turns it upside down turning the mean monster into a love sick man is the stuff daily TV shows have thrived on.
Of course there have been some twists in the tale too. Like some physical violence on the way to love on screen. In Qubool Hai, the male lead slaps the heroine in a fit of blind rage and she accepts it calmly. Sure, a half-baked and half-hearted apology comes from him, but the simpering lady has already moved on from the 'slap'. In Madhubala... you have the hero 'punish' the leading lady for having 'slapped' him by jilting her at the wedding altar and humiliating her. In the forthcoming episodes, there will be redemption from both male leads over a period of time.
The mild support : And then there's the second category. The soft spoken, supportive male lead - Aditya of Pyaar Ka Dard Hai Meetha Meetha (Nakul Mehta) Suraj of Diya Aur Bati Hum ( Anas Rashid), the leads of Sasural Simar Ka, Shiv of Balika Vadhu ( Siddharth Shukla), Manav of Pavitra Rishta (Hiten Tejwani), Rishi of Hitler Didi (Sumit Vyas), Viren of Ek Hazaron Mein Meri Behna Hai (Karan Tacker), Naitik of Yeh Rishta Kya Kehlata Hai ( Karan Mehra) - who's content to share ample screen time with the stronger female leads and is a support act. So, he doesn't humiliate his lady love or physically torture her, but neither does he take a strong stand when she's in trouble.
Surprisingly, the audiences have been forced to accept either of the two options as the 'hero' of the soaps over the last few years and when the storyline reaches a saturation point and even predictable 'memory loss', 'hero's death', 'the third angle' tracks aren't dramatic enough to get in the TRPs, the shows reach a not so dramatic climax before going off air. Because the cardboard heroes and the self-righteous and long suffering betis/bahus of TV are not flesh and blood human beings, so even their love is pure make-belief, despite the five-minute long eye-locks, the ladies landing in the heroes waiting arms and the runaway wedding cliches. They might temporarily transport a section of the viewer into a 20-minute fantasy, but even as renditions of Ishq wala Love and Teri Meri Prem Kahani float in the GECs on V-Day, audiences know better than to expect too much from reel love stories.Until of course a 'real' hero/heroine makes an appearance on TV one of these days. Miracles are possible in reel life too.
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Anupamaa
