Punjabi AntennA
New Year’s
musical treat
Randeep Wadehra
Balvinder Singh, who is Zee Punjabi’s programming in-charge, is also doing his Ph D in Sufism
|
IF you have
watched Mukesh Gautam’s classic serial Sajda on Zee
Punjabi, you would have been impressed with the quality and
extent of the research work. Well, the young man who provided
the inputs was Balvinder Singh, who is presently Zee Punjabi’s
programming in-charge, and is also doing his Ph D in Sufism.
When contacted he revealed that he was ‘discovered’ by
Mukesh Gautam, who assigned to him the twin tasks of
scriptwriter and researcher for Sajda, and also offered
him the post of assistant director.
Presently
Balvinder is directing half a dozen or so shows for the channel.
These are: Aj da Rashiphal, Sitare Ki Kehnde ne, Khabarsaar,
Ik Khaas Mulakaat, Xcuse me Please and Sohni Saver.
He also moderates special talk shows.
While watching Straight
Talk’s first episode of the year, wherein SAD general
secretary Mahesh Inder Pal Singh painted the INC in dark hues
while presenting his party in glowing colours, one wondered at
its lopsidedness although Ritesh Lakhi did try to keep the
proceedings balanced. There is a need for more representative
format. Therefore, it is imperative that academics,
professionals and other intellectuals share the platform with
politicians and bureaucrats on such shows. It ought to be more
representative of variegated viewpoints and ideologies.
New Year Eve shows
are as predictable as the day-night sequence. Songs, dances and
fun(ny) anchoring on shows like Maujan hi Maujan and Jashan-2008,
although entertaining, were on familiar lines. However,
there were some original, entertaining and thought-provoking
productions, too, wherein creativity manifested itself. PTC
Punjabi treated us to sumptuous portions of musical feast from
its ongoing The Masters series in the form of virtuoso
performances in classical, light classical, folk and Sufi
genres.
Zee Punjabi came
up with Manthan-2008—an introspective piece on the
happenings in 2008. Moderated by Balvinder, the unusual but
interesting talk-show had the entire cast and crew of the
forthcoming Punjabi flick Munde UK De on its sets—director
Manmohan Singh, singer Amrinder Gill, actor, anchor and dialogue
writer Rana Ranbir as well as actors Jimmy Shergill, Neeru Bajwa
and Gurpreet Ghuggi. The discussion covered such topics as the
Obama phenomenon, terrorism, the plight of the girl-child and
the state of the Punjabi entertainment industry as well as the
absence of highbrow literary activities in the region.
The animated
discussions showed that our filmwallas, too, have
informed opinions on what’s going on in the world. On their
collective angst at unrealistic representation of Sikhs in
Bollywood productions, one could not help wondering as to which
community has ever been realistically portrayed in our cinema.
Another unusual—probably
a first on Punjabi television—Devinder Pal Singh of PTC News
took the viewers on a tour of the newsroom, introducing us to
not only the highly skilled and talented back-office staff and
sophisticated gizmos but also to the various processes involved
in collecting, editing and telecasting news. Interesting,
indeed, and could be useful to students of mass communications,
too.
This particular
piece exposed the hitherto unknown aspect of Devinder’s
anchoring—his ability to pepper the narrative with funny
asides. And yes, the channel, too, came up with a round-up of
the year 2008. The show titled Safarnama covered
regional, national and international events of the year gone by
with cogent comments from Harpreet Singh, Radha Sahni,
Nirmaldeep Kaur and Devinder Singh.
On January 4, the
eve of Guru Gobind Singh’s birthday, PTC News came up with Apey
Gur Chela —a well-researched and produced historical
biopic on the Tenth Guru. Guess who was the man behind this
absorbing show? Daljeet Singh, who featured in this column
recently. Well done.
|