The Story of Maaneet - A Retrospection

This is the story of how Maaneet became Maan and Geet.

This has been an inspiring saga of how an innocent, submissive and vulnerable girl journeyed on to become a strong, fearless and indomitable woman. This has also been an enchanting fairy tale of how she went on to find her soulmate in a man, who has become the obstacle for the obstacles in her path, who has become her hidden strength in the face of multitude adversities, who has alleviated the scars of her bitter past and in so doing brought a smile back in her life, whose love is beyond words, emotions and expressions and who has become synonymous for unconditional and everlasting love.

She was a young, bubbly, simple, innocent and honest girl whose dreams were no bigger than staying with her family, to love and to be loved by them. She became the victim of a fraudulent marriage scheme, and as a result lost her innocence and honor and got condemned by her own family for a fault that was never her own. She ended up defying her own family in order to give life to an innocent who is as much a victim as she is, and as a result, she earned murder as punishment from her own family and ended up getting alienated from them. Through out these times of trial, she had no one but an arrogant stranger who through his impertinent speeches, yet humane actions became her savior and gave her the courage and strength to confront the injustices meted out to her. This enabled her to tread the path of truth and justice by getting her own brother arrested for his attempt to murder her. This enabled her to travel to an unknown city in search of a desolate new life, and thus getting the unanticipated chance to discover the love of her life in that same stranger who helped her knowingly or unknowingly through those toughest times of her life. This also enabled her to later cage her lion and make him listen to her complete truth, and finally, it has also enabled her to encounter the perpetrators of the crime against her with the moral strength of a lioness. At the end of this journey, she has been transformed into a woman of fortitude, courage and defiance, which was enough to make her face the perils of her past in order to help her true love, which was enough to make her seek and find her true love inspite of the conspiracies to hide him from her, and which was enough to make her tell him the truth that has ripped him from his brother and rendered him heart-broken.

He is a young, dynamic, dashing, daring, majestic, intelligent, powerful and successful business tycoon. On the exterior, he is an angry young man with an attitude, who does not have a care about anything or anyone except his work and his grandma. Until she lighted the spark of true love in him, he has been a recluse and a loner, who is lost to the dark brooding of his mysterious past. But on the interior that saw light only after she unknowingly and unintentionally made a place for herself in his heart, he is a loving, passionate, loyal, honest, trustworthy, considerate and sensitive person. He has been her savior in innumerable circumstances. He is her only pillar of support on which she can rely without fear. He is present in every thought that gives her hope. He is with her in every moment that she can not face alone. He is her cohort in every difficulty that comes her way. He is with her in spirit in every breath she takes. He truly is her knight in shining armor.

Theirs has been a relationship like no other. It has redefined love, hate, emotion, passion, selfishness, selflessness, conditional, unconditional and every other idea that has ever been explored through the medium of prose, drama or any other enacted series. It is a relationship where 'I hate you' became the epitome of expressing the intensity of true love, where selfishness meant nothing more than seeing a genuine smile on the other's face, where conditional meant accepting and embracing the other 'as is', where every passion and every emotion underline the strongest sense of understanding, trust, respect, and love shared by them, where mutual love is acknowledged without having to say 'I love you' and thus proving once and for all that mere words are never enough to express that which is profound and can be understood only through actual experience, where relationships are built on the strong foundation of trust born out of reconciliation with life-shattering truths as well as understanding and acceptance of each other's family and social situations, where becoming each others soul mates and pillars of support is written in their destiny and every time they struggle against the fate and try to go different ways, the universe conspires to bring them together .

Then what happened that broke two soul mates and pitted them in battle against each other, where each one's gain is also each other's loss, and in the process of which they not only hurt each other, but also hurt and alienated most of us, the viewers and hardcore fans of Maaneet, from either Maan or Geet or both of them. Come, let us explore the journey of Geet to understand the transformation of her thoughts that compelled her from saying 'Aajse Aapki Khushi Mein Geet Ki Khushi Hogi' to 'Mujhe Rokne Ki Koshish Bhi Math Kijiye.Jaanedijiye Mujhe' to 'Mein Azaadi Chahthi Hu Ya Nahi Ek Bar Mujhse Poochna Chahiye Tha'. Come, let us scrutinize how Maan who once said 'Humari Rishthe Ki Bedaag Pavithratha Ko Dekh Kar Aaj Woh (Chand) Bhi Sharmaajaayega' had to end up reflecting upon something akin to:

Hum Aise Na The
Tum Aise Na The
Kaha Khogaye "Hum"
Is Raah Pe Chalte Chalte

Kahan Chod Ke Aaye
Mohobbat Ki Woh Saaye
Pyaar Ke Khushibhari Woh Nagme
Jis Par Naaz The Hame

Woh Khushiya Khogaye Kahaan
Ab Bus Dilon Ki Barbaadi Hain Yahaan
Kaha Tha Rishta Woh Humaara
Jo Tha Pavithr Aur Pyaara

One Fateful Friday - When All This Began

A Dark Week: Let Go Or Not To Let Go

Pride, Ego or Love: What is hurt most?

Diwali Night: Broken Hearts

Pool Party: Broken Barriers

The Day After The Slap

First Day Back In The Office

Conclusion and A Request

If you have reached till here, then thanks for reading this long post with such patience, and please do not forget to hit the LIKE button. Last, but not least, thanks to all those friends whose daily takes have enriched my thoughts, and whose valuable ideas and perspectives have inspired me to write this post. If unknowingly I have hurt anyone's sentiments through this post, then please do forgive me. To err is human, but to forgive is divine.

One Fateful Friday - When All This Began

She was in disbelief about the happiness finally entering her life, especially that which has alluded her at every mode of her life. She entered the mansion in expectation of giving her assent to their marriage. But, she ended up hearing words uttered from his mouth that have shaken her to the very core because she has never expected such words to ever come out of his mouth. We, viewers, know that what she heard was only part of a conversation, which in its entirety is the exact opposite of what she heard and understood, but for her, the words she heard were the only truth known to her. Even then, she gives him a benefit of doubt thinking that she might have heard them out of context, but then she came face to face with the culprit who destroyed the innocence of her life, who alienated her from her family, who gave her multiple scars that can never be fully healed, and who left her alone to fend for herself. The very moment she got the confirmation of Maan's involvement in his bail fiasco, she lost all her senses, and all her old insecurities reared their ugly head. There is no love that is greater than a mother's love for her child, and there is no trust greater than that exists between a child and his/her loving father. When such father and mother have forsaken her in her biggest need and broke her trust, and when the husband that she so blindly trusted could break that trust by abandoning her and her unborn child, why can a brother who deeply adored his sibling can not break her trust and help his own brother at her expense. Such must have been her thoughts, we will never know. But, whatever it may be, she reacted exactly the way he told his grandma she will react if he truly harbored any such intentions. It is ironic and unfortunate that she was privy to only that part of the conversation. Had she overheard the complete conversation or if she has heard those partial words uttered by anyone other than him, she wouldn't have given them any weightage. But now, in her eyes, he has fallen from the pedestal of honor and respect where she placed and venerated him earlier. She became a victim of her own insecurities and circumstances, and she traded words with him publicly, which have started an avalanche of passions and emotions that have not only ripped them apart & almost destroyed them, but also subjected them to public ridicule and defamation. Sticks and stones break bones, but words often break relationships, and the relationship between them almost came to an end.

He understood the insecurity she felt by getting to know about the bail, but he never suspected and never knew that her conviction was based on his own words. That is why he tried to stop her to explain to her about the circumstances under which he assisted with the bail, but to no avail. But then, his motives for marriage got questioned and he allowed his passions and emotions to run unchecked. For no fault of his, he was held responsible, given nefarious motives, and stripped of his honor, dignity, integrity, and social standing. All he ever did was to love and care for her. He believed in her, and shared her burdens. He stood with her when there was no one else. He defended her at his own expense. In spite of all this, she questioned him why he wanted to marry her, and that broke his heart and left him with deep anguish and bitter memories to deal with.

On this day, reason has been overruled by half-heard conversations and heated passions. On this day, their war of words left their hearts wrecked and they were left to be ruled by their hot heads. On this day, their actions and reactions left each other forsaken and lonely with aching hearts that can be soothed by no one but the very person who is the cause of that pain. On this day, trust has been broken between them and their love has been left to smolder in the aftermath. Henceforth, this day shall be referred to as the black Friday.

A Dark Week: Let Go Or Not To Let Go

The consequence of this fallout is that both of them dwelt in the depths of misery, heartbreak and agony for a week, the depths of which can never be gauged or understood, and hence, we were offered only a glimpse of it through the concern of those around them that have witnessed it all.

'Sapna to ek Din Toot-thehi hai. Kyu gujari hui bathon ke baare me soch rahi hu mei. Udhaarme mile hue khushiya thi jo waqt ke saath chalegayi' , she says to herself and tries to move on with her life. Howmuchever she craves for those broken dreams, there is no way she can bridge the gulf that has now separated her from them. She finds herself once again lonely and vulnerable, the same as when she first left her family behind long ago on a path of no return. She has decided to let go of that which she will never be able to let go.

Yes, she has brought him humiliation. But that's the last thing on his mind. What he chose to keep in his mind is her challenge that she can live without him. He has saved her in every way a woman can be saved and yet, she told him she does not need him, and that has cut through his heart very deeply. He doesn't want to let her go. All he wants to do is to prove her wrong, and in so doing, he subconsciously hopes to make her realize that she does need him as much as he needs her, and thus, keep her with him forever because he can not live without her. That is why he pursues her the only way he can now, by purchasing the company she works for and forcefully becoming her boss again.

Pride, Ego or Love: What is hurt most?

The goal of his life has become Geet and he is giving his everything to prove his point and to ultimately win her back. She has become highly overconfident in dealing with him, perhaps because she considers herself to be on a higher moral plane than him, owing to her loss of respect for him because of the misunderstanding. She no longer treats him with the respect due to her boss and he is on a mission to teach her the basics of being an employee. It has soon started to develop into a full-fledged war of ego & pride, and the love had to take a backseat. Egotism is usually subversive to sagacity. Proving a point has become more important and the means employed to do so and the loss ensued thereafter, it seems, no longer matters. How low can pride make one go? In all these confrontations of pride and ego of hot heads, it is the loving hearts that had to pay the ultimate price of sustaining deep injuries and countless miseries.

Diwali Night: Broken Hearts

This night belongs to the tale of two broken hearts wanting to soothe each other, but ending up hurting each other more. By the time they faced each other on Diwali, he is all angry, indignant and hurt, whereas she is confused, indecisive and wavering. She wanted to start reaching out to him, but he did not want to take any more pain. She could not bear him hurting himself because of her, and he could not endure the fact that she expects him to forget all that pain she has given him.

He can not bear the fact that his physical burn is having more impact on her than his bleeding heart, and she can not bear the fact that he can no longer endure her very presence. He could not bear the fact that she could break their relationship and move on without needing him, and she could not bear his refusal to acknowledge any relationship between them.

She has finally accepted to herself that she is as affected by him as he is affected by her. She wants to hold on to that relationship even if it is held on only by a thin thread nurtured through only hatred. On the other hand, he is deeply hurt that she realizes how much he values her in his life, and yet she does not hold the same value for him in her life. At the end, his deep hurt made him determined to prove to her that she does not mean anything to him, whereas she is now not willing to let go of her relationship with him, however fragile it may have become.

Pool Party: Broken Barriers

This was the day when all kinds of barriers were broken by them and also, between them. It started with his intentionally ignoring her presence, and her feeling insulted due to his cold response to her attempts to draw his attention in order to discuss the very work for which he himself called her. It started by his saving her and thus, giving her a chance to live her life on her own terms, and her feeling insulted by his perceived rejection. It started by his poor attempts to prove to her that she does not mean anything in his life, and her getting hurt by her perception of him considering her unworthy of his attention. It started with her jealousy clashing with his need for her, her dignity clashing with his anger, and his perception of her unspoken desires clashing with her feelings of self-respect.

She reckoned that his intentions were to hurt her, but trusted that he wouldn't do any such thing, so she stayed put. But the moment she felt he was giving the same place she held to someone else, she was heart broken. Perhaps she didn't know he would go to such lengths to prove his point which really had no base. On the other hand, he was raging over their sour relationship that is slipping out of his grip, and lamenting over his lost love. He tried to make her jealous and succeeded, but she refused to accept her true feelings verbally and that instigated his anger. And at the end, both of them crossed the line of decency; he in roughly handling the only woman that matters to him most and she in giving in to slapping him, the one act she hates most. And with that the barriers erected between them by their own egos came crashing down. This gave them the chance to step back and retrospect upon their own actions and words, and finally set the stage for the much needed reconciliation the next day.

The Day After The Slap

He recollected every word of hers that told him how much she wanted to be left alone, every question of hers as to why he always finds a way to get closer to her whenever she wants to go far away from him, and every crude behavior of his that has broken the barriers of decorum and hurt the only person that gives him a reason to live for. He reflected in pain about what they were, what their relationship was, and what it has come to. Though without her his every day will from now on be as pitch black as the darkest night bereft of the moon, he has finally decided to give her what she craves most, the independence from his shadow. He has decided to let her go lest the beast within him attempts to injure her again physically or emotionally. Her every act like snatching the duppatta from touching his hand seems to reinforce his conviction that it is better for her if he goes far away from her forever.

She realizes that she has crossed a line with the slap she gave him. If there was anything she hated, it was violence, having had to endure it since her childhood. Even in a previous episode, when she almost slapped him in the outhouse, she regretted it, and at that time told us how much she hates such behavior. Perhaps, the only slaps she does not regret are the ones she gave Dev and NT, which they did deserve. Her self-reflections show that she does not forgive Maan for his behavior with her, but she considers her slap as an extreme response. The same is reflected later in the apology she offers Maan. She clarifies to him that her sorry is only for the slap and she still does not approve of his behavior towards her. She dreads his silence and asks him at the end to answer her. When she finally understood his answer, she realized she was on the verge of losing him forever, and in that realization she also discovered how much he really means to her, and she rushed to repair the damage lest it is too late.

The much condemned slap has broken both their egos. The way he dealt with the discourses after the slap and his thought process clearly showed how guilty he feels. And she on her part did not refuse his new job offer saying 'I don't need your help in finding another job'. Their relationship has gone from being individualistic to helping the other, from burning in their own pain to feeling the pain of the other, from hurting each other to trying to save the other from the hurt. She saved him from going into the darkness today. Had she not been successful in stopping him by challenging him about getting defeated, he would have entered the darkness where it would have been most difficult to penetrate and find him again. And he made her realize how incomplete she is without him, that she in fact does need him. This short period has made her realize that she absolutely needs him. She needs him for her to live her life peacefully. Without him she is restless. Today for the first time she experienced the fear of losing him. This is the same fear he felt on that day when Brij's companions took her captive and almost killed her in Hoshiyarpur.

One thing is definitely lucid. She has adopted to think and behave like him unconsciously; all the way from saying 'Bas Ek Aur Shabdh Nahi' last week Monday to 'Chup Bilkul chup' on Wednesday to 'Dargaye' dialog of Thursday. At every stage, she has displayed how much she has learned from Maan to deal with life. From the days of being a stranger to the days of being an ardent lover, he has given her the strength to be able to live, to face the troubles of her life and emerge a winner on her own without his help. There can be no better proof for this than her victory today in stopping him from completely leaving her, and what better proof can be there than this to justify what he said at the very end, "Tum Meri Madad Ke Bina Jeet Bhi Nahi Sakthi".

First Day Back In The Office

He always knew how much her presence was important in his life. He always knew how incomplete he feels without her. He also always knew that she controlled his life in such a way that he has no control over it anymore. But today when she lost her consciousness and did not respond to his earnest pleas, all these things gained a more profound implication to him. He felt as if the very breath has left his own body. His care, concern and worry indicate how much she means to him, how much lost he will be without her, and how much he fears of hurting her by his actions that can be driven out of control by her mere presence. Never ever can he forsake her, and anyone who contemplates on hurting his Geet better beware because they will be not be spared from his wrath. He will for sure hunt them down to the ends of the earth if need be and leave no stone unturned in the bid to ensure that they receive their proper punishment.

She is affected by him as much as he is affected by her. She understands his silence as much as he understands her's. She is as much restless for him as he is for her. Inspite of the uncleared misapprehension, she has opened up her mind and is ready to reciprocate to his every gesture and accept him in her life "as is". After seeing him repent so strongly, she could not possibly refuse his offer to take her to the doctor. Had things been the same before the slap, she would have retorted 'I don't need your help'. The slap has not only brought him back to his senses but also made her realize that depending on someone is not that bad after all. What more proof can we get about their broken egos than the fact that both called each other knowing the other would have guessed it. But, this is just the beginning. Transformation of her thoughts regarding Maan will be complete, and she will be restored to her previous loving self of pre-Black Friday days only after her misconception gets cleared totally. He still has to be restored to the same respectful position he held in Geet's eyes from where he has fallen due to her misunderstanding about his actions and intentions on that black Friday when she maligned him in front of the whole world. Until then, there will be a shadow lurking behind every reconciliation they have.

All the same, I fear the day when she realizes her mistake, which was highly appalling. How will she react? She is one person who would go to any lengths to correct her mistakes. Once she realizes it, she never hesitates. But the impact the entire thing would leave on her would be something to never forget. Her reaction, after she finds out that Maan was innocent, may compel her to take a drastic action and try to leave saying she doesn't deserve him. It may force her into a bottomless pit of guilt and despair. But at the same time, Maan may never give her that chance to leave him ever again and he will definitely never let her lose herself in the darkness of the despair caused by her guilt. He will save her the same way she saved him from falling into a similar darkness. If Maan is the benefactor and Geet the recipient, then there are times when she is the provider and he the acceptor. They have proved time and again that they are incomplete without each other, and they are each others strength as well as weakness at the same time.

Conclusion

Both of them are responsible in their own way for the outcome of this epic clash of their egos, passions, emotions, and half-truths, but both of them are blameless at the same time. This one encounter has shaken the very foundation of their relationship. It has started to test every promise they ever made to each other, and evoked such raw passions that turned their love, which once nurtured their relationship, to burn them in desolateness. It actually reminds me of a forest fire, which burns down an entire forest from an old tree to a new sapling with equal ferocity, the one calamity dreaded by all forest beings, but that which is often necessary to restore the ecological balance. Once the fire dies down, a new forest takes form, stronger and livelier than the older one. Similarly, once their passions calm down enough, this encounter will redefine a balancing point for their relationship, which will then emerge with more strength and vigor. Remember that strength of relationships is defined not by what we adore in the other person, but by how we deal with the worst in the other person.

Will the story end here? No, it will go on till once again Maan and Geet ultimately become Maaneet, and it will continue further about how they will remain one soul in two bodies till the last breath leaves their bodies and beyond.

THE END.

A Request

Love scenes, if genuine, are indescribable; for to those who have enacted them, the most elaborate description seems tame, and to those who have not, the simplest picture seems overdone. Every heart knows how much a heart weighs, but only the heart that has experienced it first hand can understand the real pain of being broken. Did Maan or Geet's love become so much bitter that it can no longer be loved? Are their mistakes so gigantic that they can not be forgiven? Has their relationship become too weak to be believed in? Did all hopes perish about their tarnished love getting restored to its previous brilliance?

To love means loving the unlovable
To forgive means pardoning the unpardonable
Faith means believing the unbelievable
Hope means hoping when everything seems hopeless

Would we have fallen in love with Maan without Geet or Geet without Maan? Isn't it their interactions with each other that made us fall in love with them? You might ask: What would we gain in the end by watching all this heartbreak? As my dear friend dolphinUSA says: Love itself is beautiful. It's the forms it takes that destroys everything. Love can be care, concern, happiness, emotion, passion and it can also be hatred, madness, craze, insanity and anger. Depending on how you nurture your feelings, it can make you or it can break you. So, we, the viewers, will get to witness not only the fight against numerous social injustices, but also in the bargain, we get to experience the different shades and forms of manifestations of love as stated above, and in the process understand and appreciate the true essence of pure love, which is like a rose that exists amongst the thorns of other lesser emotions like ego & anger and yet can never be injured by them. We will also stand to gain real life lessons about how misunderstandings can be erased by nurturing loveful, pure thoughts, and making one to understand at the appropriate time. We will also learn that to taste the sweetness of life, one must forget the bitterness of the past. In the end, we will end up craving to have that special someone in our lives, who will be like Maan to Geet and Geet to Maan. So, it is my sincere request to all Maaneetians to stop fighting and bashing, and to relax, sit back and enjoy the ride yet to come from this smart team of Geet HSP. May their creativity retain the same brilliance till the story is all said and done.

Hey...dat is awesum...fablous...wonderful... mindblowing..!!!