Why Maneka Gandhi should watch Doordarshan’s TV series Main Kuch Bhi Kar Sakti Hun

Women and Child Development Minister Maneka Gandhi recently proposed an unheard of strategy to tackle female foeticide. She mooted compulsory registration of pregnant women and compulsory sex determination of the foetus to track female foeticide. She could be on to something. Or is she?

The idea is different and it could have collateral benefits too – for instance, it may finally ensure access to maternity benefits and healthcare that are due to any pregnant woman. (Yes, there are maternity entitlements legislated in India too.) But let’s not forget, in India, over 35 per cent mothers are yet to get the minimum required ante-natal check-ups, according to the 2014 RSOC (Rapid Survey of Children) data. Alternatively, the strategy could endanger pregnant women who may genuinely need to abort the foetus owing to complications as lawyer and feminist Flavia Agnes explained in Rahul Kanwal’s show, Newsroom. Gandhi’s idea needs much more work.

But if Gandhi’s idea does become law, I will feel very sorry for all the script writers of general entertainment serials and infotainment serials who would have written reams of pages, multiple episodes on the trials and tribulations of bahus and other protagonists resisting the scourge of ultrasound tests, sex determination of the foetus and, god forbid, ultimate foeticide.

Although, it is too much of a stretch to expect Indian soaps to be updated content wise, or have any brush with fact-check. But as a thought experiment, it is interesting to imagine how story plot-lines would change if ultra-sound, sex determination of foetus is actually legalised.

Unplanned and unmarried pregnancies seem to be the stock narrative of many saas-bahu soaps. But where are the soaps in Indian TV (I mean Hindi entertainment category) that actually show the social, healthcare and medical aspects before, during and after pregnancy? Surely, much can be done without making it a boring non-fiction documentary?

The over-presence of saas-bahu serials notwithstanding, in private channels’ general entertainment landscape, it is difficult to name a single serial that is tackling reproductive rights, planned family, patriarchy, working women’s issues in a meaningful way. And I am counting the much written about Balika Vadhu too.

A doctoral researcher, Nidhi Shendurnikar, was looking into the missing real working women in Indian television soaps. She found kitchen politics and sacrificial goddesses, who were reinforcing gender stereotypes. Turns out, a similar exercise looking for soaps addressing pregnancy, planned families, adolescence, healthcare crisis and the everyday challenges of gender stereotypes is equally futile in private TV channels.

But once you expand your search to Doordarshan (DD National), it yield results. Doordarshan. That broadcaster that should be public but continues to report to the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting. Doordarshan — the same channel that topped the BARC (Broadcast Audience Research Council) ratings once small town and rural viewership was added up. No wonder it got a shout-out from All India Bakchod in their show On Air with AIB.

Doordarshan has an educational entertainment serial Main Kuch Bhi Kar Sakti Hoon, scripted and directed by Feroz Abbas Khan of Tumhaari Amrita and Gandhi Viruddh Gandhi fame. It has Farhan Akhtar as the sutradhaar/narrator. It is into its second season after the success of its first season, as the Indian Television beta site states. The first season got 58 million viewers and 600,000 direct phone calls from viewers.

It takes on reproductive rights, broken health care system, patriarchy, gender issues one episode at a time. The story of Main Kuch Bhi Kar Sakti Hoon revolves around the journey of Dr Sneha Mathur (the protagonist) who represents the everyday woman of India, emotionally torn between family and society, professional aspirations and personal commitment. Her navigation through these multiple commitments and multiple roles forms the core of this soap opera. It has all the drama components of violence, deceit, corruption, romance woven in while conveying social messages, challenges, attitudes and stereotypes. And it doesn’t celebrate the urban as the liberal zone or lament the villages as stuck in time-warp.

I did some binge watching, looks like the serial is located overwhelmingly in fictional North Indian villages. If there is a season three, taking the serial setting to some of South Indian villages where public services are much better, mindsets more progressive and human development indicators more robust, would be a good idea. It would be a scripting challenge too.

But what really worked for me in the serial was its ensemble cast, without any known names. Good old-fashioned scripting, a solid strategy of public engagement and a well-known narrator, seemed to be the modus operandi. It has some seriously de-glammed characters, the next-door neighbours we come across every day. Even the protagonists, Sneha and Arjun, are equally everyday-ish! The everyday lives of everyday people. Though Sneha can be even more de-glammed.

Going by the number of viewers and direct audience engagement (as first season evaluation revealed) it is surprising that it is not creating as much buzz as Satyamev Jayate did. Google search for review articles also did not throw much from media commentators.

Perhaps that is why Maneka Gandhi hasn’t caught it yet. Perhaps her colleague JP Nadda, the Minister of Health and Family Welfare, should send the jumbo pack of Season 1 episodes and the already aired Season 2 episodes. The serial tackles social challenges and mindsets that make female foeticide possible. It highlights the infrastructural challenges and the colluding medical fraternity, in short, the multiple challenges. And it doesn’t show medico-legal solutions to deep-rooted social problems but offers social strategies. All through story-telling.

Maneka Gandhi should definitely take time out to watch it. And it will be good to read media commentators review and write more about Doordarshan serials too. After all it topped the BARC ratings.

Main Kuch Bhi Kar Sakti Hoon airs on DD National on Saturday and Sunday at 7.30 pm.