Why Saas-Bahu Serials are FAILING

It was the year 2001, and one death shook the entire country. Outside an office building in Mumbai, 25 women gathered and started throwing stones asking why this death happened. They started breaking windows and asking why they killed him.

Why did he get murdered? In the Andheri area, many women asked to bring him back. How can you bring a dead person back?

Who was this person? Kyunki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi's Mihir Virani. The show's creators knew that Mihir's death would bring a twist to the story.

But they had no idea that the audience would react like this. Shohini Ghosh, who is a professor at Jamia Millia Islamia University, said "In my university, everyone was talking about it. " "And I'm like, who is Mihir Virani?

" "And then everybody's really upset. " "And a whole range of people are upset. " "People who are elder, people who are younger, people who are middling.

" Many viewers thought that Amar Upadhyay, who was playing Mihir's character, died in real life. "So I don't know why some people misconstrue that something happened to the actor. " Amar Upadhyay said that he got calls late at night where people complain to him about the show.

He got letters, some of which were written in blood. And people said that if he doesn't come back to the show, they'll stop eating sweets for the rest of their life. "Star Plus received so many letters that its mailbox crashed.

" Finally, the producers had to listen to the audience. Since 2020, the viewership of general entertainment channels has fallen by 20-30% every year. But now, the story of TV serials is very different.

Since 2020, the viewership of general entertainment channels has fallen by 20-30% every year. General entertainment channels are channels like Star Plus, Colors, Zee TV, Sony and Sab TV which make family entertainment shows. It's surprising because these shows have high-quality drama!

But seriously, many popular TV shows are struggling right now. For example, after 2020, Anupamaa used to be a top show. Its rating was 4+, but now it's 2.

8. This is what Saurabh Tewari, a writer and producer in the Hindi TV industry, has to say about Indian TV serials. So, what happened to Indian TV serials?

How did they lose their popularity? That's what I want to tell you in this video. This was the first Indian TV serial that premiered in 1984.

That too, on India's only TV channel. But the purpose of this show was not to entertain, but to educate people. Now, India had television since 1959.

But Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru believed that since more than half of the population in the country are poor, television is a toy that is very expensive for people. So, the government didn't pay much attention to television. This changed in 1975 when Dr Vikram Sarabhai was the head of the Indian Space Research Program and he felt that television could be used for social change.

This was the time when Dr Sarabhai was working with NASA on the Satellite Instructional TV Experiment through which educational content could be shown on television. So, till 1983, television was used only to educate people, whether they were school children or farmers. At that time, only one channel broadcasted everything.

The government eventually realized that it could use television to reach more people. So, Doordarshan was given the responsibility to make programs that spread awareness about adoption and birth control among people. Inspired by a Mexican soap opera, Hum Log was made to spread awareness about family planning.

At the end of every episode, popular actor Ashok Kumar told people what problems could arise due to having large families. This show talked about the issues of a typical Indian middle-class family, such as the drinking problems of the father, issues of girls in a male-dominated society, or economic problems of a large family. Hum Log attracted a new audience.

An audience that not only wanted education but also entertainment. During those 17 months, when Hum Log being shown on television, Doordarshan was getting 400 letters every day. This connection was so strong that when the character, Badki, got married in the show, many shops and markets were shut down for the celebration.

After this show, many other TV shows came out, like Yeh Jo Hai Zindagi. This show was written by writer Sharad Joshi. And this show became so popular that it had an impact on the film business as well.

Because this serial and films were released on Fridays. But then two series were about to be released on TV, This show was so popular that people would postpone weddings to finish watching the episode. Ministers would come late for their swearing-in ceremony.

And trains would be stopped so that the viewers could finish the episode. Many people would watch this show as if they were in a temple. Before the show, people would take off their slippers, cover their heads, and put garlands on the TV.

Arun Govel, who played the role of Ram, was considered to be Maryada Purushottam (Supreme Man). Because of this, it was difficult for him to get other roles. The next year, B.

R. Chopra's Mahabharata was released. The same happened with this show.

People would leave their work early so that they wouldn't miss the episode. Then in 1991, our government took a step that changed not only the economy but also the film and TV industry. Because of the reforms in 1991, India entered the global market.

Imported goods started to enter India, along with foreign investments. And the TV industry was about to transform. In 1962, there were only 41 television sets in the country.

And there was only one channel. In 1991, there were 7 crore homes with TVs and more than 100 channels. Domestic channels like Zee TV and Sun TV were introduced.

But international channels like CNN and Star TV were also introduced. Where Doordarshan's focus was to show rural India's characters, these new channels thought, why not show the image of a global Indian? But to watch these channels, you needed a satellite TV connection, which was very expensive.

This meant that the target audience of these channels was only a few rich people. Because of this, many people couldn't watch primetime serials like Tara, which were released on private channels like Zee TV. Doordarshan felt that this was an opportunity for them.

Why not copy this, and reach a bigger audience? That's why they released TV serials like Shanti and These serials were shown in the afternoon and targeted homemakers. This means those women whose primary responsibility was to take care of their homes.

But surprisingly, these shows became popular among working women as well. A 1996 research showed that working women started going to their friends' houses during office hours so that they don't miss their episodes. A company got the whiff of the success of this format.

Balaji Telefilms. July 3, 2000, was a day when a TV serial was released which neither had big actors nor was this channel very popular. At that time, Star Plus's parent company, Star TV India was struggling because their Hindi-dubbed English shows and movies didn't attract Indian audiences.

A few months later, on October 16, 2000, this same production house released another serial. These shows changed the image of Star Plus. In 2000, Star Plus just had 90 lakh viewers.

In five years, the number doubled. From 9 to 11, it became a prime time slot. Now, TV shows existed even before these serials.

But these K-serials had something unique. Their production value was high and their theme songs and opening scenes were memorable. These things were new for the Indian audience.

That's why other channels started copying this concept. Many channels released their own serials and by 2010, Star Plus, Sony, Zee TV and Colors started dominating the Hindi general entertainment market and their collective market share increased by more than 90%. Research shows that people liked such shows because of their intense emotional drama.

But to understand this emotional drama, we need to go deeper. 51-year-old Veena Mathur had the same routine for many years. She would sit at her dining table at 7.

30 and watch her favorite TV show. While cooking food, she would watch her favorite TV characters. She would say that there were characters in TV serials whose lives were difficult.

After watching these shows, I realized that my life was not that bad. I have good relationships and my life's going to be better. ".

. . I cater to them.

" "I'm here to entertain women who have lived homely lives, who're homemakers. " "I make shows for them. " "I really don't make shows for the top, upper strata of society, who want to have their creative juices flowing through television.

" "I'm sorry. I make shows for the masses. " Gautam Hegde, a TV screenplay writer, said that there are many relatable factors in these shows.

While watching an episode, a mother might think that I wish my son or daughter-in-law was like this character. TV serials have been going on for a long time. But these dramas talked about the equation between mother-in-law and daughter-in-law for the first time.

Because of this, these shows entered every home. And these stories were also a little predictable. Initially, the mother-in-law doesn't like her daughter-in-law.

Because the mother-in-law is very strict and yearns for her son's love. But eventually, this relationship also gets solved. These concepts were relatable because research has shown that the tension between mother-in-law and daughter-in-law is not a rare thing in our society.

For example, a veteran writer in the industry wrote that daughters-in-law like Tulsi and Parvati were very similar to each other. Shoma Munshi wrote in her book that most daughters-in-law's characters were inspired by Mata Sita, who was loyal and moral. Moreover, they made these shows aspirational.

These shows weren't set in small houses but in big, luxurious houses. All the characters wore nice sarees and jewellery. Their lives were luxurious and modern but their values were very traditional.

"I don't see your son. . .

" "Why? " "I'm here in his place. " "He doesn't need to come.

" "He will choose what I choose for him. " "He will nod when I nod. " In these serials, conservative and family-centric issues were discussed.

This is why the audience loved these serials because the values were similar to theirs but these shows were aspirational because they showed what we can do with money. Shoma Munshi, who is a professor at the American University of Kuwait wrote in her book that all these shows were inspired by Bollywood films of the era. Kamlesh Pandey, who was a writer for many television projects, said that Ekta Kapoor watched many films of her father.

She repackaged those films as family dramas for TV. After the 1990s, many Bollywood movies talked about Indian culture, values and tradition. "Tradition, Honor, Discipline" So these TV shows were responding to globalization.

India is becoming modern but our values are still traditional. Ideal daughters-in-law like Tulsi and Parvati were showing how much they compromise for the honor of the family. But this wasn't enough.

To make serials engaging, there was a common villain in them all known as VAMP, an evil woman. These women wanted to destroy the daughter-in-law of the family. As if she is the Surpanakha from Ramayana.

To make her a villain, catchphrases were used. This was something she repeated many times, either in her behavior or in her dialogue. Since all these serials were about traditional values, it was not difficult to show these characters as villains.

The best way was to dress them in short and modern clothes. For example, Komolika wore bold clothes and a weird bindi. Her behavior was seductive.

Now, for Indian traditional women, wearing short clothes or a weird bindi was automatically a negative thing. So it was not difficult to establish these characters as villains. These characters made the story interesting because everyone could see the dark side of women.

These women not only had an on-screen impact but also had an off-screen impact. Even in fashion trends, we could see their impact. But there was a problem with these serials.

These serials were aired every day. Now, it becomes difficult to sustain the show. So, to catch the audience, the producers decided to bring in family twists and drama.

This made the show engaging. So much drama was put into these shows that the audience didn't get a chance to leave. Whenever a character gets slapped, the camera zooms in.

These shots are called Swiss pan shots where there's loud music. This is a signal to the audience that something important is about to happen. The audience is given a shock with this music so that they go to the remote and turn down the volume.

There's a strategy behind this too. During the primetime slot, everyone is busy at home. In this situation, these shots grab the audience's attention with high volume.

So, it was a smart strategy to keep retention high. To maintain the drama, the TV serials made the concept of rebirths very normal. Whether it's plastic surgery or memory loss, we got to see such things.

For example, in the serial Kahaani Ghar Ghar Kii when another actress replaced Sakshi Tanwar. . .

. . .

plastic surgery was used to explain why there was a new actress. In other shows, continuity is ruined when an actor leaves. But in Indian TV shows, everything was possible and the drama continued.

These shows were marketed well. For example, this was the last scene of Ekta Kapoor's serial. If you've seen this serial, you'd know that Parvati keeps a lamp in a river.

But in the last episode of this show, a new girl picks up this lamp from the other end of the river. Who is this new girl? The lead character of the serial, which premiered at the same time as the last TV serial.

So, Balaji used one TV serial to market its next TV serial. This is a very clever marketing strategy used to ensure that the audience who was watching the first TV show gets transferred to a new TV show. Another marketing tactic was that many serials were run at the same time where the same actors were present.

". . .

all happening in Balaji. " "Nobody could go out. " "Actors were overlapping.

" "So Parvati would go to do Kahaani and then she would come to do Karam. " "And she would come to do another show. " "Even the outside passages were filled.

" "One serial is being shot inside the temple and another is being shot outside it. " "So one scene is taking place in the parking lot. " Every floor was packed.

The point was that the fan base of any actor watched all the shows. It was obvious that the competition for these shows increased after a while. Whether it was Indian Idol, Jhalak Dikhlaja, CID or Crime Patrol.

But industry experts like Jaideep Shani and Sujoy Waddawa said that these shows couldn't compete because the Indian audience needed drama and storytelling. Most of the reality shows in India were copied from the Western media which the Indian audience couldn't relate to. There were exceptions like KBC but this happened because their format was localized and Amitabh Bachchan was popular.

So, there was no competition to such serials in Indian TV. But now, this domination was in danger. In 2015, 28.

5% of people watched Hindi shows on Star Plus, Zee TV, and Colors this number decreased to 22. 6% after 3 years. After many years, the audience got bored of the same format.

Today, the audience wants to watch fast-paced content. In fact, many industry experts believe that now the the audience expects realistic content. TV shows where such scenes were shown are now used for meme content on Instagram and not for the primetime slot on TV.

For example, employment increased especially among women and they became more educated and employed. They became aware of the world and now they demand realistic, progressive, and diverse content. But TV serials can't meet their needs.

The producers of Saas Bahu serials couldn't adapt their content for the new audience. Yeh Rishta Kya Kehlata Hai was so popular that the producers kept adding new seasons to the show. But now, the audience doesn't want to watch repetitive content.

The CEO of Ormex, Shailesh Kapoor says that people are tired of fictional content and want to watch non-fiction content. Kids don't want to watch cartoons and adults want to watch business shows instead of Saas Bahu serials which are entertaining and educational. This is what Aman Gupta from Shark Tank said.

It's as if we're going back to the era of Doordarshan 40 years where people want to watch educational content instead of entertainment. For TV serials, competition isn't just coming from Shark Tank but also from OTT. Apart from this, competition is also coming from people like me because I'm making such educational and entertaining content.

Right? If you liked the video, please subscribe Due to such competition, the condition of TV serials has worsened. Because Ekta Kapoor brought high production value to these serials now it has become more difficult.

Because these TV shows are not earning money that's why producers can't invest much money in these serials. That's why the visuals are bad, the writing is very weak, and the story is shabby. Because of this Gopi Bahu's fans aren't watching TV.

Instead, they're watching memes of her on Instagram Reels. If you liked this video, I've made many videos on pop culture. You can watch this video which is about the biggest problem of Bollywood.

Why are actors charging such high fees? Because of this films have also become very bad. So watch this video.

If you've watched this video, then you can watch this video: Why are Hindi songs only 2-3 minutes long because of Reels?