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Sony
has set its sights on leading prime time ratings every Friday
with innovative fare. To this effect it has announced the
launch of two shows aimed at having a dramatic effect on
the audience.
The first one is a weekly supernatural show with a difference.
Achanak  the
brainchild of writer Shridhar Raghavan will air every Friday
at 10:30 pm starting from 22 March. It has the tagline 37
saal baad.
Speaking on this Director On Air Programming SET Anupama
Mandloi said, " The name grabs your imagination. This is
a psychological thriller. It is like reading a novel on
television. The show is built on a solid foundation a great
script. It is representative of the faith the channel and
the producers have in taking this genre a step further.
Most importantly it is created by a team which understands
this genre and where its appeal lies for the viewer".
The producers of the show are Pradeep Uppoor and Neo Films.
They together with Sridhar have worked on Aahat and CID
for the channel. Like Achanak both of them had a
lot of suspense. A serial from Pradeep Uppoor and Neo Films
Srikant was shown on Doordarshan and Channel 4.
Speaking about the project Shridhar Raghavan said, " Achanak
started off a few years ago as a slightly wild outrageous
notion, a set of unlinked fragments of ideas. What if you
went home and your parents did not know who you were? What
if you were happily married and someone from your past told
you that it was nothing more than a hallucination?
Achanak is a battle royal between good and evil.
But its a long fight, a tough fight mostly a losing fight
for good. Good eventually wins over evil but it gets one
hell of a bloody nose before it does. Or does it?"
Shridhar also envisioned the setting which is the town of
Gahota as a twisted version autHor R.K. Narayan's Malgudi.
He sees the project as something unlike anything seen on
Indian television. It is weird, bizarre and outrageous with
a complex undercurrent running through it.
In the deceptively calm town of Gahota over the past couple
of months something evil has been occuring. Murders, suicides
and acts of madness  have
been taking place. An alchoholic journalist Dipankar travels
to Gahota believing that he has the explanation for why
crimes are committed in the town once every thirty seven
years for a period of three months. Once the turbulent period
has passed people cannot recollect what happened.
The producers built a real town in Panvel not just a TV
serial set. a town square, clock tower, residential areas
etc were created.
Regarding casting decisions Shridhar said that some important
members do not appear until half the episodes are completed.
Also some characters have a touch of eccentricity to them
like a professor whose stance shifts with each encounter.
There is a hint of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde waging a war
within the characters. He also revealed that one of the
central protagonists will appear only in the final act.
Cast members include Raj Zutshi, Faraaz Khan and Shishir
Sharma.
He pointed out the differences between Achanak and
Aahat. Aahat was episodic involving a single
continous story. Aahat dealt with big issues concentrating
more on pace as opposed to plot. Achanak on the other
hand is about small things. It is about how decption can
hide underneath a sea of normality. It also deals with the
thin line that separates sanity and insanity, light and
dark, good and evil.
 The
second new weekly show on SET is called Par Is Dil Ko
Kaise Samjaye. It premiers on 29 March at 8:30pm. It
deals with how the relationship between two sisters gets
affected by a series of accidents brought about through
sheer fate.
A woman loses her sister and husband. For companionship
and to support her sisters offspring she marries her brother
in law. However later on it turns out that her sister survived
the accident. Now both of them are married ot the same man.
The show is directed by Imtiyaz Punjabi and stars Raj S
Verma, Shweta Salve and Pooja Ghai.
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