Since we were recently discussing gender norms in Pakistan, I am sharing this TV review I wrote some years ago. “Humsafar” was one of the most popular Pakistani TV dramas and it revolved around the theme of gender relations. This continues to be a major theme in Pakistani dramas. Part of the reason that I don’t watch Pakistani TV is that the dramas are largely full of crying women and toxic men. However–according to a family friend of mine who writes TV plays— this is actually what the (largely female) audience wants.
It’s also interesting to note that “Humsafar” is the drama that made Fawad Khan and Mahira Khan a star couple on Pakistani TV. (They are not married. “Khan” is a very common last name in Pakistan).
Since last September, one TV serial has taken Pakistan by storm, becoming a major topic for conversation and forcing people to reschedule social occasions so that they don’t clash with the program’s time slot. Entitled Humsafar (Companion), the drama has made stars out of its leading couple, Fawad Afzal Khan and Mahira Khan. The play is a typical melodrama, centering around the relationship between Ashar and Khirad and the intrigues that drive them apart, intrigues created by Ashar’s controlling mother, Farida. Yet somehow, this hackneyed plot line has had the entire nation hooked for six months.
To briefly summarize the plot: Ashar is the son of a rich man living in Karachi and working in his father’s company. His cousin, Khirad, meanwhile lives a middle-class life with her mother in Hyderabad. Khirad’s mother finds out that she has cancer and calls her brother (Ashar’s father) and asks him to help her. Her brother brings her to Karachi and gets her treatment, but it is too late. As she waits to die, she begs her brother to get her daughter married so that she is assured a secure future. Her brother agrees, telling her that he will marry Khirad to his own son. Ashar agrees to honor his father’s promise, but his mother, Farida, is totally against the marriage, believing that Khirad is beneath her son’s standard. Farida has also hoped that her own niece, Sara, will become Ashar’s wife. Sara loves Ashar and believes that she will eventually marry him. However, under threat of divorce, Farida is forced to accept the marriage. While her husband is alive, she pretends to accept Khirad but as soon as he passes away she begins plotting to get rid of her. Her plot involves making Ashar believe that Khirad has been unfaithful to him. Ashar is made to witness a scene in which Khirad is alone in the kitchen with another man who is holding her dupatta in his hands. Farida immediately accuses Khirad of infidelity, and though Khirad begs Ashar to believe she is innocent, he rejects her. Farida than throws Khirad (who is pregnant, unknown to Ashar) out of the house in the middle of the night. Khirad writes a letter to Ashar, telling him that what he saw was orchestrated by his mother, and that she is pregnant. However, Ashar doesn’t read this letter until much later.
Khirad gives birth to a daughter, Hareem, and the story moves ahead four years. Hareem has a congenital heart condition, and Khirad comes to Ashar to tell him that he has a daughter who needs open-heart surgery. She herself shows no desire to reconcile with him, but simply wants him to do his duty towards his child. Ashar takes the responsibility of getting the child treated, and mother and daughter move into Ashar’s house. Ashar begins to fall in love with Khirad again, but Khirad decides that once Hareem is well, she will leave her with her father, and go back to Hyderabad, believing that Ashar can provide her daughter with a much better life than she can. When she leaves, Ashar discovers her letter of four years ago and learns the truth. He rushes after Khirad to bring her back. Meanwhile Sara has realized that she was manipulated by her aunt and that Ashar will never love her. She commits suicide. Ashar returns and confronts his mother, who subsequently has a nervous breakdown. Ashar and Khirad reconcile. Continue reading Humsafar and Shakespeare