As I see one episode of this much acclaimed and most decorated serial every month, I cannot but help feel sorry for the spouses of families where womenfolk (I hazard a guess) are glued to the screens religiously every night 5 days a week. As they follow the shenanigans of this highly dysfunctional family, they are in threat of creating a rift in their own personal lives by depriving their family of quality time. All household errands are put on hold, children are disposed to beds or stuffed into a room, husbands given the cold shoulder, telephone calls seen as intrusions, neighbors visiting as conniving enemies, TV on the blink during serial time as the hand of the Devil, commercials as necessary evils and any legitimate demands from the family as perverts seeking pleasure in disruption and mayhem!
AS for the contents of the serial, most of the previously expressed opinions of kindred souls in this forum do full justice to it. Not one member of this large extended family seem to lead a normal life as skeletons seem to not only be rattling in very room cupboard but liberally scattered in every step of this household. If Balaji Telefilms led by the omnipresent Ekta see the antics of this exceptional family as reflections of the average middle-class Indian household, they must need psychiatric treatment. Letting the leading ladies spew out periodically on the virtues of ’Bharatiya Sanskars’ does not absolve the producers of the blame of presenting an utterly skewed vision of family life in Indian households.
I hope that the viewers mature from being mere spectators of a imbecile production into a demanding and discerning audience who go beyond entertainment and seek value in what is being dished out every evening to them. Or the least they can do is to record the serials and watch them during daytime to avoid widening the rift in their own functioning joint family!