Pakistan Drama Serials: A Feminist Nightmare

For the last couple of months, my mother and I have been hooked to TV serials running on Hum TV, ARY and Geo TV. Most of the high profile ones are, mercifully, quite short and wrap up the entire plot in 15 to 16 weeks.  The quality of production is impressive and there is commendable acting talent. Stories of political scandals, love, money and family drama on a backdrop of extraordinary wealth and lavish set designs, have indeed found a niche and are, admittedly, addictive.

The glitz and the glamour, notwithstanding, some very disturbing trends beg the question of what we’re internalising as consumers of Pakistani soaps. Perhaps it is futile to ask, yet again, the erstwhile question of whether life imitates art or art imitates life. But then again, with every new trend in popular culture, it might be worth digging a little deeper in what are obvious red herrings, lest it is accepted as legitimate representation.

The first glaring problem is the role assigned to women in most (if not all) of these TV serials. Whether a woman or a man writes the plot, all characters written for women are not just expectedly cliché, but also shocking at times.  Women are either decidedly passive, silenced by the men in their lives (for e.g. Yaarian on Geo TV, Qaid-e-Tanhayee on Hum TV), or stubborn, incoherent rebels out to shame their families (for e.g. Paarsa on Hum TV or Haal-e-Dil on ARY). Then there are others who exude classic patriarchy by opposing female education and arranging forced marriages (e.g. Qaid-e-Tanhayee on Hum TV).  Stereotypes are aplenty: even where there are female lead roles depicting strong, independent women, one finds them in the toughest of circumstances going through some far-fetched trauma. In they end they either capitulate to the classic demands of the society or end up leaving the country (for e.g. Ishq-e-Gumshuda on Hum TV or Haal-e-Dil on ARY).

Most of these stories revolve around elite families in Pakistan and their personal strife.  I come from a fairly privileged background myself and yet, after watching at least six of these shows till the end, there was not a single woman I could relate to. Why is the narrative of oppression the only available narrative on TV in Pakistan? Despite the economic hardship, the daily frustrations of a patriarchal society and lack of choices prevalent around us, there are many of us who lead fulfilling lives and do not choose male domination as the singular underlying narrative of our life.

Increasingly, these drama serials have become an echo chamber for ridiculous ideas regarding education, marriage, career, love reiterated by women themselves. This would not be a problem had we a variety of opinions being voiced by female characters but that is not the case. Nearly every single show on T.V. today has a couple of token women who spew self-righteous inanities about not educating their daughters, suspecting their daughter’s intentions when they go out of the house, restricting women’s mobility in urban settings, distrusting women’s choices of who to marry and so on and so forth. These women then go around reprimanding others who are going astray and the old blame and shame game ensues.

It is important to point out that these characters are deliberate caricatures developed either to mock the increasingly conservative mass consciousness or to hold up a mirror to the society. In voicing these opinions, it is quite apparent that most of these producers, writers, and directors are laughing at the women they are writing about. But that isn’t the contention here. It is the sheer prevalence of such characters that is the problem. It is as if an alternative conversation about women and their lives in Pakistan is impossible or non-existent.

Lastly, while some attempt is made to include a cross-section of society in the characters to make it more representative of class divides in the country, most of the successful stories were based on lives of the exceedingly rich and their disconnect from the world outside their mansions. It is quite an absurd site to behold where, on one hand there is a huge house spread over thousands of yards that most Pakistanis cannot relate to, and on the other hand there are these people living in these houses that think and behave like the writers expect the larger populace to think and behave.

Women travel with ease to foreign countries, divorce cheating husbands, run their ex-husbands businesses but yet confront the most horrifying backlash when say, falling in love with a person with disability. Sitting in an expansive mansion, we see a head-strong young woman miserable because her father threatens to get her killed if she continues to meet her blind friend and her gradual acceptance that daddy knows best. In fact, by the end of it most of these women resign to a fate ordained by other people controlling their lives. Again, I’m not saying this does not happen but I am saying that they do not reflect millions of Pakistani women who did not fit this drama serial narrative. What is more, they are also not representative of so many Pakistani men who are, in fact, progressive, supportive and enabling of women’s choices.

It is alienating to watch this night after night; to enjoy it as entertainment one either has to totally disconnect from it or employ the proverbial suspension of disbelief. But alas, I am probably going to continue watching these drama serials as they attempt to unfold the all-Pakistani woman’s story. Due to a troubling lack of variety on the telly, all absurdities, contradictions, generalisations and caveats be damned.